


Like a California King

by fictionalaspect



Series: Like a California King [1]
Category: Bandom, Panic At The Disco
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe - Canon, Blood, Blood Brothers, Can be read as original fic, Coming Out, Coming of Age, Exhibitionism, High School, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mild Painplay, Multi, Recreational Drug Use, Road Trips
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-31
Updated: 2012-08-31
Packaged: 2017-11-13 06:49:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 38,446
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/500669
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fictionalaspect/pseuds/fictionalaspect
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>First time, wasn't it," Ryan says, and Brendon would think Ryan was mocking him if he didn't look so serious. "Little Mormon boy sees the big, bad homosexual sin...?"</p>
            </blockquote>





	Like a California King

**Author's Note:**

> An AU story based on Panic's road trip out to visit Pete in December 2004. Please head the warnings. Thank you to everyone who helped cheerlead this story over the past year, especially [desfinado](http://archiveofourown.org/users/desfinado/pseuds/desfinado), [hermette](http://archiveofourown.org/users/hermette/pseuds/hermette) and [mistresscurvy](http://archiveofourown.org/users/mistresscurvy/pseuds/mistresscurvy). [mistresscurvy](http://archiveofourown.org/users/mistresscurvy/pseuds/mistresscurvy) also did a fantastic last-minute beta – thank you so much bb! ♥

_Come let us make bricks and burn them hard,_  
We'll build a city with a tower for the world  
and climb so we can reach anything we may propose,  
anything at all. 

_-[Skyscraper](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nn0t1TfNdao), Streetlight Manifesto_

 

The first time Brendon ever went to LA was via a Urie family trip, sixteen Urie relations all flying out on three different flights and two different airlines. They'd all planned to drive and then Kara and Brendon and his cousin Jill had passed around a stomach flu, and suddenly six hours in a car with a hoard of miserable, puking kids hadn't seemed like such a great idea.

Brendon mostly remembers throwing up on the airplane. He remembers his dad holding his hand and promising Brendon that he'd see him in four hours, just before he walked off and boarded his flight with three of Brendon's cousins and his aunt in tow. This trip to LA is nothing like that childhood memory, not least because Brendon didn't spend the whole time throwing up, although he thinks he might if Ryan doesn't stop trying to hit every pothole on the Mojave freeway.

"Ninety-seven," Ryan says, in a bored voice, just as the van bounces again. The low light of a warm December evening slants off the horizon, sparkling on the dust motes that layer the dashboard. Brendon punches Ryan in the shoulder. 

"Why did I say you could drive," Brendon mutters, to no one and everyone. He doesn't know why he'd said yes to Ryan's big pleading eyes at the last gas station before they'd left civilization. Ryan is a terrible driver, easily distracted, prone to taking weird short-cuts that leave them hopelessly lost. Now he and Spencer are playing some bizarre road game, like if they hit enough potholes they can break Brendon's suspension for good and never, ever have to return to Vegas. 

"Because you like me," Ryan says, still sounding bored as he stares out into the desert. He drums his long fingers on the steering wheel. "I'm the hot new teenage sensation."

" _I'm_ the hot new teenage sensation," Brendon corrects, flipping his cell phone back and forth between his hands. 

"None of you are the hot new anything," Spencer says, letting out a sigh as he tries to stretch his long, long legs out by thrusting them onto the center console. Brent is slumped in the farthest seat, snoring into his sweatshirt hood. Ryan makes an annoyed noise, pushing Spencer's feet down and away. "Your shoes are dirty," Ryan says, when Spencer reaches forward to smack him in the back of the head. "Ow, fuck! Don't distract the driver, didn't you take Driver's Ed?" 

Ryan's laughing, head turned to one side as he pushes back at Spencer's flailing hand. Brendon thinks about telling Ryan to keep his eyes on the road, but there's another string of potholes coming up and he figures his chances at keeping dinner down are better if Ryan doesn't see them.

"We're in the desert," Spencer says. "God forbid you run off the road and hit a tumbleweed. We'll be doomed." 

"It's the--fuck _you_ , it's the principle of the thing," Ryan says, entirely engrossed in his slap-fight and completely ignoring the road in front of him. Brendon leans over and snags two fingers around the steering wheel, keeping the van on a mostly even course. There are no other cars in sight. 

"Guys," Brendon says. "Ryan. Dude. Driving." 

"Tell Spencer to stop being such a dicksmack," Ryan says, turning around for one last, final openhanded slap and then putting his hands back on the wheel.

"Brendon's not your mom," Spencer says. "He's not in charge of the van, or whatever."

"Damn straight I'm not," Brendon says. He takes his fingers off the wheel, kicking his heels up on the dashboard. Whatever. It's his van, and it's a piece of shit. He can get dirt all over it if he wants to. He can let Ryan drive it recklessly if he wants to. Not too recklessly, because it has to somehow get them home, but still. 

"Put some music on," Spencer says, after a long, slightly uncomfortable pause. "I'm so fucking bored." 

"You pick something," Brendon says, fumbling down by his feet until he finds the shoebox full of cassette tapes that he's managed to acquire over the years. Half of them have Ryan's scrawly handwriting on the label. They're mostly copies of indie label mix CDs that he's taped for Brendon in a three-step, laborious process. The first time Brendon had realized how long it took Ryan to make those tapes, he'd paused and looked down at his growing collection with something like fondness swimming around in his chest. Making Brendon these tapes was a generous act, and Ryan Ross isn't a particularly generous person. Ryan maintains he only makes them for Brendon so he'll have something to listen to in Brendon's car that isn't Peter Gabriel, but Brendon has his doubts. 

"Do you have anything that isn't full of Ryan's inner pain?" asks Spencer, tossing tapes over his shoulder as he roots through the box. Ryan turns around to give him an incredulous glare.

"The hell?" Ryan says. "Which one is that? No--that one in your hand," Ryan says, grabbing for the tape Spencer's holding up. After a brief tussle the tape comes free, and Ryan snorts when he sees the label. 

"You are such a poser," he tells Spencer, slipping the tape into Brendon's ancient tape deck. "You know who's on Equal Vision records? Coheed and Cambria."

"Like I said," Spencer says mildly. "Your manpain." 

"Whatever," Ryan says. "You know who else is? Boysetsfire."

"Wait," Spencer says, sitting back up again. "Wait, really?"

"Yup," Ryan says, entirely smug. 

"Their drummer is awesome," Spencer admits. "Fuck. Really?"

"Isn't Saves the Day on that label?" Brendon says, because he's not really following the conversation, can't step to the kind of indie cred that Spencer and Ryan have spent so long perfecting. He's lucky if he can remember the major bands, but he's been doing his research. Never let them see you break, that's Brendon's motto. 

"Yeah," Ryan says. "I think they signed somewhere else, though. Got too popular." Brendon waits for it, but there's no tone of silent condemnation in Ryan's voice. Brendon thinks the changeover might have come right around that time three weeks ago when Pete Wentz from Fall Out Boy flew out to see them and signed them to his record label. Funny how that happens.

"Saves the Day is awesome," Spencer says, breaking the awkward silence once again. Brendon turns to give Spencer a ghost of a smile over his shoulder, a silent thank-you for his moral support. Spencer smiles back, all white teeth and tanned skin, and Brendon tries not to stare for too long at the delicate curve of Spencer's collarbones peeking out from under his t-shirt.

Behind Spencer, there's a muffled noise, and then Brent's messy head pops up from behind Spencer's seat, blinking and yawning loudly. "Are we there yet?" Brent says, and Ryan ignores him and turns the music up louder.

\--

Brendon may have been to LA, but he's never been to a neighborhood like where Pete lives. He's definitely never made it past the gated entrance-way and the little speaker box and the casually intimidating men with dark glasses sitting in their parked cruiser just inside the gate. Brendon eases his foot onto the gas, unwilling to lurch into Pete's neighborhood in his exceedingly conspicuous van, and then Brent stage-whispers, "Dude, dude, they've got _guns_."

"They do not," Spencer says witheringly, while Ryan says "No way, shut the fuck up," and leans between the two front seats to shove Brent's shoulder. In the process he jostles Brendon's arm, making Brendon jump and his foot shoot forward and then they're speeding into Pete's private community with a sickly squeal of half-melted tires.

"Fuck" Brendon squeaks, but it's too late, and they're already well past the gateway. He narrowly misses running over someone's blonde nanny, but he doesn't miss the look she gives him. Brendon jams his foot on the brake, just in time to avoid splashing her expensive sneakers with road water. They slide to a halt, the old van's brake pads groaning in protest, and Brendon only has a moment to turn and look at his three silent, chastened bandmates before Ryan's leaning out the window, oh fuck.

"Hi," Ryan says, smiling wide and innocent. "Sorry about that. We're looking for Pete. Pete Wentz. Do you know which street is his?"

"Second street on the left," she says tightly, her mouth pressed into a thin line. "There's a speed limit for a reason, you know."

"I'll tell my driver to be more careful," Ryan promises, and Brendon leans over and pinches him in the thin strip of skin visible between his t-shirt and his jeans. 

"Ryan," Brendon hisses, when Ryan still hasn't stopped talking to the random girl, who is looking more and more unimpressed. "Ryan, we're leaving now." Ryan flaps his hand at Brendon, the universal sign for _come on man, five more minutes, I think she's wavering_. Brendon rolls his eyes and hits the gas again. The van surges forward, and Ryan's left talking to thin air as Brendon grins, smug and superior. 

"She liked me," Ryan says, as Brendon signals to take the left onto Pete's winding road. His blinker flickers in staccato, too old to keep a steady beat.

"She wanted to throw you out with the garbage," Brent says, laughing. "You have some fucking nerve, man. I thought she was going to call those gate dudes on us. I'm surprised she even gave you Pete's address."

"Maybe she wants to mingle with the common folk sometimes," Ryan says airily, flipping his phone open. "Or maybe not. Oh, look, _Pete Wentz_ sent me another text."

"No one wants to mingle with your sorry ass," Spencer says. "What did Pete say?"

"Does it matter?" Brendon says, pulling in past yet another gate. The guy in the booth just waves them through, cigarette clenched in one hand, so Brendon's pretty sure they've cleared the necessary background checks. "We're here. You can ask him yourself."

There's a weird, hesitant silence in the van all of a sudden, and Brendon spends a moment just taking that in, reflecting on how he just pulled his mom's old purple minivan into Pete Wentz's driveway. Brendon thinks about how he's pretty sure that white stain on the back seat is from that one time he talked Amanda Richardson into giving him a handjob. He hopes Pete never actually has a reason to look inside their van. Brendon's dodged the bullet so far, but if anyone's going to notice something like that, it's probably Pete Wentz. He seems like the kind of guy who can sniff out an embarrassing story from a mile away.

"I have to piss so bad, dude," Brent says, breaking the sudden quiet.

There's a chorus of agreement, and then Brendon's jerking into action, sliding out of the driver's seat and unclipping his seat belt. He lands on the balls of his toes outside the door, bouncing once, and then a light comes on near the side door and Pete is leaning out and waving to them--big smile, big grin. Brendon feels something tense and then release deep down inside. A bubble of fear, maybe. Or exhilaration. Or excitement. One of those. 

\--

Within three hours of arrival all of Panic! at the Disco has been filled with greasy, unhealthy food, offered beer and wine (no takers), offered Red Bull (gratefully accepted on all counts), offered weed (Brendon and Brent accepting, Spencer and Ryan abstaining) and ended up mostly naked in Pete's hot tub with three-fourths of Fall Out Boy.

Brendon's sure this is going to set the tone for the rest of the weekend, all systems go on the path towards decadence and debauchery, and he's silently congratulating himself on his moral degradation when Joe leans back against the side of the hot tub, blowing a stream of smoke out of the side of his mouth.

"So how many of you are legal?" Joe says. "Like, how many California laws am I breaking, here?"

"Um," Brendon says. 

"I'm eighteen," Ryan says. There is a conspicuous silence afterwards.

"God _dammit_ , Pete," Andy says, standing up, and Pete tugs him back down. 

"Everyone's over the age of consent," Pete says. "Just don't whip your dick out, and we'll be fine."

"You and your fucking teenagers," Andy says, and then thinks better of it, adding, "No offense," in Panic's general direction.

"None taken," Brendon says, even though he thinks Spencer's kind of pissed off from the way he stiffens against Brendon's shoulder.

"Like you're the only person in LA getting high with seventeen-year-olds right now," Pete says, sipping his Red Bull.

"I'm not getting high," Andy says.

"Then what do you have to worry about?" Pete says, splashing a handful of water in Andy's face. "Chill out, dude. Joe is, and he's not stressed."

"Yeah, but I probably should be," Joe says easily, leaning across the circle to hand the joint to Brendon. Brendon takes it with fingers that shake only slightly, and when he inhales the hit is thick and rough in his throat. He coughs, his face reddening.

"It's some good shit," Joe mumbles, approvingly, and Brendon nods back in agreement as he passes the joint over to Brent. The hot tub feels like a minefield, too many places to look and too many opportunities to get caught out. Brendon keeps his legs crossed and looks above-the-neck only. He doesn't watch the way boxers cling to thighs and hips and legs, because there's debauchery and then there's _debauchery_ , and as much as Brendon's ready for his new life to begin, he doesn't know if he's quite that ready.

\--

The weed makes the hours wind lazily towards dawn. 

Brendon's overtired and so he just keeps going and going because his body never knows when to quit. Patrick shows up around one a.m., bringing pizza and a sheaf of musical notations and a wide, ready smile the first time he hears Brendon harmonize on the hashed-out chorus of 7 Minutes in Heaven. The entire house seems to be gearing up for a self-indulgent all-nighter.

Brendon and Patrick spend so long together in the studio that Brendon's not even sure what time they finish; his high has worn off to a dull ache in the center of his forehead by the time Patrick yawns and tells Brendon he should probably try to sleep. Brendon sets Patrick's borrowed guitar down carefully on its stand, and follows Patrick back through Pete's winding maze of a house-cum-estate-cum-musical playground. There's at least six bedrooms, and a guest house for sleeping ten more. All of Panic! is sleeping on bunk beds tonight.

"It's to get you ready for the road," Patrick cracks, after he's guided Brendon as far as his turn-off point, which seems to be a long hallway near the main living room. Hemmy is padding along sleepily behind them, like he's going wherever Patrick goes in Pete's absence. "Put out a platinum record, and maybe Pete will let you sleep in the house some time." The words sting but the tone is friendly, served up with Patrick's ever-ready smile. Brendon smiles in return and promises to be ready by noon the next day. Patrick nods and squeezes his shoulder.

After Patrick goes to bed Brendon wanders down the hallway, towards what he thinks might be the direction of the bunkhouse. The house is silent around him. There's a pale light filtering through the windows and Brendon pauses in front of a set of family pictures, shoved haphazardly onto a mantle that's piled with odds and ends. Pictures of a tiny, curly-haired Pete share space with pictures of dogs and other babies and other lives, and Brendon thinks about how even fame can't erase history. It's a depressing train of thought so he moves on, past the entryway and the kitchen and the dining room filled with skateboards.

It's not until he nears the sliding glass doors to the pool that he's aware of any other sign of life, and even then it's just a soft little something that tips him off-- a quiet noise, unformed. It's just enough to make him pause before sliding the door open. 

Brendon peers into the darkness that shades the pool area. There are shapes outside, moving shapes, but it isn't until he pushes his nose closer to the glass that he can identify them. It takes time for his tired brain to map their movements onto familiar voices and faces, but once he does he's frozen. His heart pounds in his chest like a freight train and Brendon thinks _Adrenaline, fight or flight, that's what this is_. 

He watches as Spencer tilts his head back, arms braced behind him, mouth falling open. 

He's seated shin-deep on the edge of the hot tub; Ryan must be standing on the very bottom, because only his shoulders are bare against the rolling foam. Ryan gets cold easily so it makes sense, but what doesn't make sense is the long pale unbroken line of Spencer's skin, chest to hip to thigh visible in wide expanse. What doesn't make sense is Spencer's hand in Ryan's hair, smoothing it away from Ryan's face, and Ryan's mouth buried in Spencer's lap. 

Brendon watches as Spencer rolls his hips up with a muffled gasp. Ryan pulls off in response, his mouth wet and glistening. He says something to Spencer that makes him laugh, and then Ryan's surging up out of the hot tub, grinning and tackling Spencer back onto the painted tiles. The lines of his body are clean and smooth, and Brendon can see everything from this angle. His heart races in his chest. He thinks _that's so weird_ , and then he thinks _that's beautiful_ , and then he's not thinking anything at all because Ryan's sliding a hand between their bodies, gripping both of them purposefully. The thick head of Spencer's cock peeks out of Ryan's fist, and Brendon turns and runs away before he can see any more. 

\--

Brendon wakes up groggy and disoriented in his bunk. He doesn't remember falling into bed last night but he must have, because he's lying on his old Transformers sleeping bag from middle school, with his sweatshirt balled up underneath his head as a pillow. He stretches out, cracking his neck with an audible _pop!_

"Dude," someone mumbles, and Brendon looks across the aisle to see Ryan blinking sleepily at him. "That's so gross," Ryan says, like he doesn't crack his neck and his knuckles and his back all the time. Like he's not a skinny weirdo made up mostly of bones and sinew. 

"Whatever," Brendon yawns. "You do it too." 

"Doesn't that stunt your growth?" Spencer says, from somewhere above Brendon's head. 

"No," Ryan says, frowning. "Idiot. How would that stunt your growth?" 

"I don't know," Spencer says, yawning long and loud. "I saw it on the news, though. It was something about how cracking your back ruins your cartilage." 

"That's weird," Brendon says, for lack of anything better to say. He looks over at Ryan and thinks, _you sucked Spencer's dick last night_ , and then Ryan's alarm goes off on his phone. Above Ryan, Brent wakes up with a violent start, and then Brendon's too busy laughing at Brent to think about Ryan and Spencer.

\--

"Truth or dare," Pete says, and Patrick looks up from the studio board and rolls his eyes. 

"Pete," Patrick says, and everything he needs to say is there, in that one syllable. _Pete, we're in a recording studio. Pete, we're working. Pete, I love you, but this is a bad idea_. 

"Dare," Joe says. "As in, I dare you to stick your naked ass out that window and moon the next person who walks by."

"You used that one last time," Pete says. "Total forfeit. No way."

"Says you." 

"Truth or Dare," Pete says, ignoring Joe, and this time his gaze lands on Spencer, tapping away at his phone with his legs kicked up on a nearby amp. 

"Truth," Spencer answers, without looking up. "I'm not shoving my ass out a window." 

"New Avril Lavigne album," Pete says. "Honest thoughts. Don't lie." Spencer snorts at his phone, but he stays silent. The air in the room fills with an expectant pause. Brendon wants to open his mouth and admit that he kind of liked it, that sometimes when a single comes on the radio he'll turn it up real loud if no one else is in the car. He keeps his mouth shut, and fiddles with the cord on his studio headphones instead. 

"Spence. Spencer. Come on, Spence Wentz," Pete needles, and Spencer shrugs in response.

"There's one or two good songs," Spencer says, eventually, and Pete crows in achievement while everyone laughs. 

They play truth or dare for a while until everyone starts trickling out, until even Ryan and Spencer are starting to look bored. Brendon feels momentarily bad for keeping everyone here but it's fucking Fall Out Boy, and he's recording backing vocals for their new goddamn album. He wants to roll around in that knowledge and rub it all over his body and plaster it on a giant, blinking sign above his head. If he has to track something nineteen times because Patrick Stump wants it a certain way, he's going to do it. Ryan and Spencer and Brent can suck it up. 

After a certain point Ryan and Brent leave, heading off to find food with Pete and Andy and some of their studio techs, and Brendon's left alone with Patrick and Spencer. He doesn't know why Spencer didn't leave with Ryan; he's obviously bored, alternately wandering around and poking at all the expensive equipment and playing games on his Sidekick. Andy's three recording kits have been disassembled and moved out of the way to make room for the guitar and vocal tracking, so there's not much for Spencer to play with. 

"Okay," Patrick says, nodding and making the universal symbol for "cut!" through the clear glass. Brendon lets his voice trail off, and then sets the headphones back on the stand when Patrick motions for him to come back into the soundbooth. 

"Let's mix it up real quick and see if that works," Patrick says, and Brendon takes a seat next to Spencer, who has abandoned his Sidekick and now looks interested. Spencer bumps his shoulder against Brendon's when Patrick turns away, giving him a flash of a smile. Brendon realizes suddenly that Spencer stayed here for him; he probably thought Brendon was nervous, and didn't want to leave him all on his own. 

Brendon isn't nervous, not after all the time he spent hanging out with Patrick last night, but Spencer doesn't know that. Spencer doesn't know that because he was really busy having sex with Ryan in Pete's hot tub last night. 

Brendon nods and mouths _thanks_ in Spencer's direction anyway. It's the thought that counts.

They're interrupted in the playback by the arrival of Pete and company, barging in with bags stuffed with cheap Italian dinners in aluminum takeout containers. Brendon snags one full of pasta and meatballs--"No cheese," Patrick says firmly, when he sees Brendon eyeing a dish full of Chicken Parmesan--and sits down in the corner, where someone has tossed a large bean bag chair. Spencer follows him, and Brendon raises an eyebrow.

"Hi," Brendon says, uncertainly.

"Hey," Spencer says. He settles in next to Brendon on the floor, spreading his breadsticks and sauce cup and pasta dish out on a folded paper bag, pulling his plastic utensils out of their plastic casing. Brendon waits a moment and then he's blurting out, "Why aren't you eating with Ryan?"

"Huh?" Spencer says, his fork pausing just above his spaghetti.

"Never mind," Brendon says, mumbles really, but Spencer apparently heard him, because he gives Brendon a weird look. 

"What do you mean, why am I not eating with Ryan? We're not surgically attached at the hip, dude." 

"No, I know," Brendon says, because it's not like Spencer and Ryan are even that bad. They're best friends, sure, they finish each other's sentences and take up each other's space in a way that makes Brendon quietly ache inside. But at the same time, Brendon's hung out with both of them one-on-one plenty of times. It's just that during all of those times, Ryan and Spencer weren't--whatever it is they're doing right now. Dating. They weren't dating then. 

"I just thought. . ." Brendon says, and then trails off again when he realizes he was about to say _I just thought you'd want to hang out with him since he's your boyfriend and all_. He's pretty sure Spencer and Ryan don't want anyone to know. Or maybe last night was the first time, and now they're avoiding each other because it's awkward. Either way, it's none of Brendon's business what Spencer and Ryan do in bed. Or what they do in Pete's hot tub.

"You thought..." Spencer says, letting the words hang in the air. 

"Nothing, shut up, I'm just--just ignore me," Brendon says, and picks at his pasta until Brent comes over and starts telling them all about the Disney starlet they saw while waiting to pick up their food at the Italian place.

\--

Later on, Ryan catches Brendon's arm once he's pulled the van back into Pete's winding driveway. Brendon looks over at the front passenger seat in confusion, but Ryan just gives him an emphatic look, staying silent until both Spencer and Brent have jumped through the sliding door and sauntered into the house. They don't seem to notice that Ryan and Brendon aren't following.

"What are you--" Brendon starts to say, wonders if this is when Ryan comes clean to him about how many members of his new band are sleeping with each other, but Ryan keeps his hand on Brendon's forearm and hisses, "Sssh, not so loud." 

"Fine," Brendon whispers back. "What's up?"

"I talked to Pete," Ryan says, and he's closer than he needs to be, Brendon is certain of it. Ryan is all big eyes and thin mouth when he's this close. Brendon never knows what to do in this situation so he usually just tries to stay still. It works about as well as it always does.

"About what?" Brendon says, tapping his heel against the ancient floor mats, spattered with burger grease and crusted soda syrup. _Tap. Tap_.

"He wants us to stay for a while," Ryan says. "Like. He said we could stay for the rest of the week if we wanted to. He'd put us up. We could hang out. See L.A." Brendon stops tapping his foot. 

"What?" Brendon says. "Ryan, it's Christmas in like, three days."

"I know," Ryan says. "I'm just thinking like, do you _really_ want to go home? Because I don't want to go home." 

"Not really," Brendon admits, tilting his head back so he can see the top of the van's velvety ceiling. He thinks about his shitty apartment, about spending Christmas alone because even if Ryan's been coming around a lot lately, he's probably going to ditch Brendon for Spencer now that they're dating. 

"Stay with me," Ryan says. "Stay with me, Brendon. C'mon, we'll say fuck it and just not go back."

"I have to work," Brendon says. His foot is tapping again, without his permission. _Tap. Tap Tap_. "I'd have to call out sick." 

"Fake it," Ryan says. "When else are you going to get to stay in L.A. for free for a week?" His hand is still on Brendon's arm. His fingers are warm. 

"What about your boyfriend?" Brendon says, and then he thinks _oh fuck oh fuck Brendon shut the fuck up_ but Ryan just squints at him in confusion.

"What?" Ryan says. "I don't have a boyfriend." 

"That was stupid," Brendon says quickly. "I say stupid shit sometimes. Just forget it." 

"Who did you think was my boyfriend?" Ryan says. 

"No one," Brendon says, and he tries not to remember what he saw. He tries to look at Ryan with a perfectly neutral gaze, to see him only as a friend and a guy and not someone who lights that hidden spark somewhere in the low curve of Brendon's belly. It doesn't matter, because Brendon isn't like that. _Tap tap tap_. He doesn't want that. _Taptaptaptaptap_. He really doesn't want that, he doesn't--

Ryan puts his hand down over Brendon's knee, stilling the motion. Brendon freezes. 

"You saw us," Ryan says softly, and it's not a question. Brendon tries to breathe. Air is good for him and useful and important. Ryan's hand is warm on his knee and Brendon is super good at breathing.

"I didn't mean to," Brendon says, an admission of guilt and a bold-faced lie, all at once. Brendon didn't have to stay and watch. He should have run away as soon as he realized but he didn't, did he? He stayed. He doesn't want to think about what that implies.

"Shit," Ryan says. He drops his hand from Brendon's knee and leans back, out of Brendon's space, falling back into the front seat with a muffled thump. He crosses his arms over his chest and looks out through the front windshield, but he doesn't seem angry, precisely. Brendon knows how to tell when Ryan's angry. 

"I'm sorry," Brendon says, after the silence has gone on for too long. "I won't say anything. I'm not going to treat you guys any different, I just--"

"Brendon," Ryan says patiently. "Shut up for a second, okay?" He slants a look at Brendon from the corner of his eye, not quite turning away from where he's staring firmly out the windshield. Brendon shuts up for a long moment and then Ryan says, "What did you see? All of it?"

"I don't know," Brendon says, holding up his hands like he can ward Ryan off. "It was only a few seconds, I swear. Just enough to figure out it was you, and then--"

"Brendon," Ryan says, turning to face him. "Calm down. I'm not mad. It's just--weird. That you know."

"I'm okay," Brendon says. "I'm totally okay, what are you talking about?"

"Your hands are shaking," Ryan says, and Brendon clenches his fist around the curve of the steering wheel. 

"So?" Brendon says carefully. 

"First time, wasn't it," Ryan says, and Brendon would think Ryan was mocking him if he didn't look so serious. "Little Mormon boy sees the big, bad homosexual sin...?"

"Shut up," Brendon says. "I've watched porn. I told you. It's fine. I'm fine. You know I don't care. I'm not going to be any different around you guys." 

"You've watched gay porn?" Ryan says. He sounds incredulous.

Brendon bites his lip, and keeps silent. Ryan stares at him for a moment, and then shakes his head.

"I know you're not going to be any different around us," Ryan says. In the pale light emanating from the garage door mount, he looks very young and very tired. "I know you're not an asshole. I didn't think that was up for discussion." 

"Good," Brendon says. "Yes. Okay." 

"Okay," Ryan says. "But no. We're not dating. It just--happened." He reaches over and unlocks the passenger-side door, sliding down and out of the front seat and on to the pavement. 

"Think about Christmas," Ryan says, before he turns and heads inside. Brendon waits until he's sure Ryan is nowhere in sight, and then he lets his head fall forward onto the steering wheel until he can feel the fake-leather stitching pressed up against his eyebrows.

"Fuck," Brendon says, to no one in particular. "Fucking hell." 

\--

"Okay, so one more time, you guys don't have to do this if it weirds you out," Spencer says. He's sitting on his bunk, legs on the floor, hunched over the pocketknife that he's rolling back and forth between his hands. Brendon knows what's coming; they'd talked about it on the ride up, about how if this band shit was going to get real they all needed to be serious about committing to it. 

"Spencer and I did this when we were twelve," Ryan says. "It's not that bad."

"Of course you did," Brent says, rolling his eyes. "Whatever, I'm in." He holds out his arm, pushing his watch up so they can see the thin blue veins on the inside of his wrist. 

"Me too," Brendon says, mirroring Brent. Adrenaline sings in his chest. He feels giddy. "Go for it. I want it. Just don't hit an artery or something."

"Haven't yet," Spencer says. He flips the pocket knife open, and then motions for them to sit down on the floor in a circle. They'd dug an old first-aid kit out of the bathroom in the bunkhouse, and it's sitting in the middle of the floor. Spencer had promised that he was really only going to cut deep enough to just get a drop or two, but Brendon has his doubts. 

"You're not scared of blood, right?" Ryan says. He's sitting pressed up against Brendon's side. 

"No," Brendon says. "Do me first, c'mon." He crawls across the circle to Spencer. Spencer looks up at him through his eyelashes and then gently takes Brendon's wrist in his hand, and all of a sudden Brendon can't breathe.

"This is going to hurt," Spencer says. He presses the knife down and cuts a thin, sharp line, four inches below Brendon's wrist bones. Brendon's vision goes hazy for a moment. All of his awareness focused on the pain. 

"Done," Spencer says, and lets Brendon take his wrist back. Brendon presses his fingers to the cut, smearing a drop of blood between his thumb and forefinger, fascinated. It's so weird to remember that there's all this stuff inside him, inside all of them, filling them up and pushing them forward.

"Do me next," Ryan says, and holds out his wrist. Spencer pushes Ryan's bracelets back and makes another neat cut, not too deep, just enough to let the blood well up in tiny beads along the surface.

"We can't actually all do this at once," Ryan says. "So I'm going first with Brendon while Spencer does Brent."

"Okay," Brent says. He crosses the room to Spencer and repeats the ritual, hissing as Spencer makes the cut.

"That shit really hurts," Brent says. "Like, I knew you said it was going to hurt. But that _hurt_."

"Blood brothers," Ryan says solemnly, grabbing Brendon's hand. He squeezes once, and then he presses their wrists together, holding them close for a long time, long enough that Brendon's sure they've managed to exchange something. Blood, life, energy--he doesn't know. His toes are tingling.

"Blood brothers," Spencer says, holding out his own wrist. He's pushed his cut a little deeper, and Brendon can't help but grin when he sees it. Trust Spencer to want that extra edge of pain.

"Blood brothers," Brendon says, performing the same ritual that Ryan did to him, only in reverse. 

Brendon reaches over for Brent afterwards, performing the ritual while Ryan and Spencer do the same. Brent grins at him, bright and happy, and gives Brendon a solid fist-bump.

"You're in now, man," Brent says. "Welcome to the family."

"You're making us sound like the mob," Spencer says, reaching out for Brent's arm. All of their wrists are smeared with small drops of blood. Brendon spares a moment to wonder if they've all just given each other AIDS, but he doubts it. Ryan's the only one who's actually had sex, and as far as Brendon knows he only did it with Tarah and they were both virgins.

"We're better than the mob," Ryan says, reaching out to open the first-aid kit and grab a disinfectant wipe. "The mob doesn't have synthesizers."

"Wiping my germs off so soon?" Spencer says, raising his eyes at the way Ryan's carefully cleaning his wrist.

"I'm covered in your germs," Ryan says. "One disinfectant wipe isn't going to get rid of them."

"We should probably throw these away in a dumpster or something," Brendon says, reaching for his own wipe. His wrist is still bleeding sluggishly. He thinks Spencer cut his and Brendon's the deepest. Brendon wonders what that means, if it even means anything. "Pete might get suspicious if there's a pile of bloody towelettes in the trash."

"And if we all have Band-Aids on our wrists," Brent adds.

"I'm hiding mine behind my bracelets," Ryan says, reaching for a band-aid. "I just want it to be clean first." 

"Since when do you care about being clean?"

"Since when do you care about what Pete thinks?"

"I don't care if Pete notices the Band-Aids," Brendon says, slapping a large one on his own cut. "Whatever. What's he going to say? He's not my mom." 

"I just don't want him to think we all had some kind of weird suicide pact," Brent says. "That kind of shit doesn't exactly scream 'reliable new band for your label,' you know?"

"Whatever, if he asks just tell him it was a bonding experience," Spencer says, cleaning his own cut and covering it with another bandage. "You don't have to give details. He knows we're cool." 

"If anyone's going to understand, it's Pete," Ryan mutters, and Brendon bumps Ryan's shoulder gently in solidarity. The lyrics to 7 Minutes in Heaven aren't all that obscure. He doesn't really know much about Pete's history, but he knows that Pete's shared a lot of it with Ryan. He suddenly understands Ryan's reluctance to bring something like that up right now, while they're recording.

"Ryan's right," Brendon says. "But let's just keep it quiet, okay? Pete's got enough of his own shit right now. He doesn't need to worry about us. Brent can hide his under his watch, and I've got some bracelets and stuff in the van."

"I'll borrow some of Ryan's," Spencer says, and Ryan nods and begins untangling a few from his arm.

"So it's done," Brendon says, looking around. For a tiny, crazy second, he feels like he has a family again. They can't replace the one he's lost, but it's a start. "We're brothers."

"Blood brothers," Spencer says, smiling wide and bright.

\--

Pete sidles up to Brendon the next afternoon, drapes his arm across Brendon's shoulders and steers him away from the smell of the outdoor grill and the lazy chatter of a stoned Sunday afternoon cook-out.

"You still planning on heading back to Vegas tonight, oh owner of the van?" Pete says, deceptively easy. He smells good when Brendon breathes in, like some strange mixture of deodorant and coconut hair gel. 

"If it was up to me, we'd be staying," Brendon says. He'd thought about it long and hard for a few hours, but it's really a no-brainer; between hanging out with Pete over Christmas and being miserable, Brendon's going to choose hanging out with Pete. Spencer had voted to stay as well, but Brent had made a face and said that not only would his parents kill him if he skipped out on his family's annual trip to Colorado, he'd promised Kristen a romantic night in on Christmas Eve. 

"See, that's the thing," Pete says casually. "Because I have some events lined up for the week in between Christmas and New Year’s, especially with Clandestine. And I still haven't found anyone I can steal away from the label who isn't on vacation, which means I'm short a few lackeys."

"Really," Brendon says, trying not to sound too interested.

"And I have all of this money socked away to pay those lackeys, too," Pete says. "It's not that much, but I'd say it's, oh, about the price of a couple of plane tickets from here to Vegas. Maybe some food and gas along the way." Brendon's heart is pounding, a steady _thumpthumpthump_ of sudden deliverance.

"So you want us to stay?" Brendon guesses.

"I want you guys to bust ass for me on these events and man tables and charm a lot of people into buying our merch," Pete says. "And I want you guys to stay out here so we can work on your ideas for the album more. Think of it as a PR opportunity for the band. And some extra practice." 

"And you'd pay for Brent and Spencer to fly back to Vegas," Brendon says, careful to keep his voice soft and quiet. "And then Spencer could come back out and we'd drive back after New Year's."

"Brent could come, too," Pete says, looking over his shoulder at where Brendon's bandmates are clustered around the grill. Hemmy is sitting on Ryan's feet and panting happily up at him, despite all of Ryan's attempts to gently move him. "Unless you guys don't want...?"

Brendon shakes his head. "His family's going on vacation to Colorado," Brendon points out. "They go every year. His grandparents are there." 

"What about Spencer?" Pete says. "I need at least three of you. Some of these events can get crazy, although they probably won't this week. No one's really in town, but." Pete shrugs. "It's L.A. The show still goes on." 

"He'll be able to come," Brendon promises, and fuck if he doesn't mean it with every fiber of his being. As soon as this conversation is over, he is going to find Spencer and make him figure out a way to get back here after Christmas as soon as he possibly can.

"Go talk to your guys and then come back and talk to me," Pete says. He's still got his arm around Brendon's shoulder, and he squeezes once before dropping his hand so he can pull his cell phone out of the front pocket of his jeans. He checks the time and then looks over at Brendon. "I need to know in the next two hours," Pete says. "I've got people who can set this up for you, but they need a little bit of lead time." 

"Done," Brendon promises, the wheels already spinning for a story he can help Spencer sell to his parents. Pete nods and heads over towards where Joe and Andy are stretched out on two of his over-large deck chairs, and Brendon walks over to Spencer and Ryan and Brent to call an emergency planning session.

\--

The ride to the airport the next morning is curiously quiet. Brendon's barely awake, still in his basketball shorts and flip-flops and Ryan isn't much better. Spencer's bleary-eyed in the middle seat, resting his arms and head on his duffle-bag, and Brent has his headphones turned way up because he isn't speaking to any of them. 

Brendon feels bad about the way things worked out, he really does, but he's not going to turn down a week at Pete Wentz's house. It's not his fault that Brent couldn't get out of his family's vacation plans. Brent will get over it eventually. 

Brendon pulls up to the drop-off area for domestic flights and leaves the motor running while he gets out and makes sure that Spencer and Brent have all of their stuff. A tiny part of him is curious to see Ryan and Spencer say goodbye, but there's nothing out of the ordinary to see. Spencer hugs Ryan exactly as long as he hugs Brendon, and then he turns and slings his bag over his shoulder and heads in to find the flight desk. Brent follows him with a half-hearted wave and a mumbled, "Bye, guys." Brendon ignores the faint disappointment in his chest and then hops back into the driver's seat, waiting until Ryan puts his seatbelt on before he pulls out into the flow of traffic again.

"You're not my mom," Ryan mumbles, and Brendon shrugs. 

"Let's go get coffee," Brendon says, because it's 8:30 am and he's already awake and he's not going to be able to go back to sleep so he might as well start his day extra-caffeinated. 

"You're buying," Ryan says, and tucks his face against the side of his seatbelt so he can lean on it and nap upright.

Brendon goes through the first Starbucks drive-through he sees and gets two large extra-extra iced coffees, one for him and one for Ryan. Twenty minutes later Ryan still hasn't woken up and Brendon is lost, so he decides to just keep driving until something interesting happens. He's got a full tank of gas and it's Christmas Eve; it seems like a good combination. 

The morning is clear and breezy and Brendon feels like he always imagined being famous would feel: weightless, guileless, full of promise. He's not famous yet, but they will be. Brendon can read it in the curve of the sun against the horizon, in the angles of his rearview mirror and the way Ryan's hands are clenched loosely in his lap. The morning is a mark sketched with hidden meanings.

\--

Ryan wakes up just as Brendon's pulling into the partially deserted lot of a smallish local beach. Brendon watches as Ryan blinks and yawns, forcing himself upright and rubbing sleep out of his eyes. 

"This isn't Pete's," Ryan mumbles, staring out at the waves. He gives Brendon a confused look, and Brendon shrugs. 

"I got you coffee," Brendon says, tilting his head at Ryan's untouched iced coffee in the center console, now melted into sugary, coffee-flavored water. Ryan makes an agreeable noise and reaches out for it, sucking on the straw with obvious enjoyment. Brendon takes the key out of the ignition, and then he opens his door and slides down onto the sand. It's soft between his toes and the soles of his flip-flops, not yet warm from the heat of the morning.

"Where are we?" Ryan says, ambling around the side of the van to where Brendon is standing and stretching, arching his back as he pushes his hands and his shoulders towards the sky. 

"No idea," Brendon says. "At some point we should probably call someone and figure out how to get back to Pete's."

"Right," Ryan says. He takes another loud slurp of his drink. "You want to go swimming?"

"Hell yes," Brendon says immediately, because he'd been planning on going swimming with or without Ryan's participation, but it's always more fun with two. 

They strip out of their t-shirts and shorts and pack them into small bundles tied around Brendon's car keys and Ryan's cell phone, so Brendon won't forget and lock his keys in the van like he did at Spencer's house that one time. The beach is relatively uncrowded and there are few observers as they make their way down to the water in their underwear, dropping the bundles a careful distance from the shore. 

Brendon stares out at the ocean and wonders how long he's going to have to wait for Ryan to fully submerge himself. Ryan's never been a fan of the "get it over with" approach to temperature shock, but as Brendon's shaking his shoulders out and getting ready to run in Ryan surprises him by lining up next to him, as though they're preparing for a marathon.

"Yeah?" Brendon says, trying to keep the smile off his lips, and Ryan nods, looks forward into the sea while at the same time grabbing Brendon's hand. He has a tight, almost painful grip, and Brendon holds on and then runs until he can't anymore, until the water is up to their stomachs and his legs are jittering and the splash and shock of the waves is the only thing he can process.

"Fucking--fuck," Ryan swears, shouting and aimlessly splashing as though it will help him warm up faster. The water isn't that cold, but Ryan's always been a wuss about that sort of thing. 

"Go all the way under," Brendon shouts back, and then he's tucking his arms around his knees and sinking down, down, down. The water is empty and crystal clear around him, and when he opens his eyes he can see Ryan's skinny legs and the floating tips of his own hair. By the time he resurfaces, he can feel the tell-tale pulse in his veins that says his body is almost acclimated to the chill. He shakes himself off and then Ryan is tackling him, tugging Brendon under with an arm around his waist and Brendon feels so bright and so full, filled to the brim with something he can't quite name. 

The sun is high and hot in the sky by the time Brendon starts itching to be dry again, and his arms ache from splashing and swimming and trying to pull Ryan under. Ryan looks oddly young like this, with his hair slicked back from his face; the faint trails of last night’s mascara still linger around the corners of his eyes, and his wide smile belies his usual sullenness.

Brendon wonders, not for the first time, if maybe Ryan is someone different to every single person who sees him. He wonders what Ryan looks like to Spencer, and then he pushes the thought away. It's none of his business if Ryan smiles that same smile for Spencer when they're alone.

They tumble out of the waves and flop down on the beach, and then Brendon immediately regrets it because now he's all sandy. He looks over to see Ryan making a similar face, brushing at his arms and then giving up and lying back down with a huff. 

"We should have brought towels," Brendon says, casting around for something to say that doesn't touch on the fact that Ryan's bare shoulder is resting against his bare shoulder, or that Ryan's stomach is long and flat and pale when Brendon looks at it out of the corner of his eye. "I probably have something in the back of the van. We could go look."

"There's no point in looking now," Ryan says, and flicks a clump of soggy sand off of Brendon's forearm. "We're already covered in it."

Brendon nods. "It's Christmas Eve," Brendon says, and it feels strange to say that out loud while he's hundreds of miles from his family and everyone he's ever known except for Ryan Ross. "We should do something exciting."

"Pete wants us to go to some party with him tonight," Ryan says. He has one arm partially covering his eyes as he squints up against the sunlight. "He said it's a house party, so I'm expecting everyone to be really rich and dress like they're really poor." 

Brendon snorts. "I'm sure we can contribute to their need to slum it with the hungry masses," Brendon says. "I will happily eat all of their expensive party snacks if it makes them feel less guilty about their life choices." 

"Right?" Ryan says, turning on his side so he can smirk at Brendon. "It's weird because you know these guys all used to be regular people, they didn't grow up rich, but now they drive Beemers and talk about their investment packages while they're drinking Corona and it's just--it's so weird. I hope we don't end up like that." 

"Pete's not so bad," Brendon says, because it's true. Pete's pretty down to earth for who he is, and so far he's been diligent in his attempts to make Brendon and the guys feel included.

"The guys from Fall Out Boy aren't," Ryan agrees. "Some of their friends, though...?" He lets the sentence trail off, and Brendon nods again. There's been a lot of people in Pete's house these past three days, and not all of them have been as cool as Patrick and Andy and Joe.

"Agreed," Brendon says, and their conversation lapses into silence. Ryan turns to lie on his back again, one arm thrown up over his eyes to protect them from the sun. Brendon closes his eyes and listens to the sound of waves rushing in and out. He thinks about his family, about all the silences that have stretched out between them these past five-odd months. There's an ache somewhere in his chest sharing space with this strange feeling of freedom and jubilation, and the sensation of being pulled into two separate emotions at once is unnerving. 

"Do you believe in God?" Brendon asks, the words coming as almost as much of a surprise to him as they are to Ryan, who turns his head and blinks at Brendon in astonishment.

"What?" Ryan says.

"Do you believe in God," Brendon repeats slowly, and then waits for Ryan's reply. Ryan purses his lips, making a stupid face at Brendon before realizing that Brendon's actually serious. 

"I don't know," Ryan says eventually. "I think--I think God is a good idea in theory." 

"Yeah," Brendon says. 

"But then everyone's always fucking it up and damning people to hell for really dumb shit," Ryan says, and he's staring intently at Brendon now, searching for a reaction. "I don't believe in any of that. I think it's more likely that there _isn't_ a God, than it is that some God somewhere would send people to eternal torment for falling in love or jerking off." 

"Yeah," Brendon says again. He looks up into the clear blue sky and thinks, _I don't know what I believe_. Ryan's words have the ring of truth to them, pointing to a conclusion so pure and obvious that Brendon can feel it deep down in his bones. "I don't know what I believe anymore," Brendon says, for lack of anything better to say. "I don't think I even believe in God." Ryan makes a muted noise of agreement, just barely audible over the rushing of the waves. 

"There's no God in LA, anyway," Ryan says. "If you need to have a spiritual crisis or something, this probably isn't the best place to do it." 

"I'm not having a spiritual crisis," Brendon says. "Or, like, maybe I am, but it's okay. I think I'm almost done with the crisis part of it. I just didn't realize it until right now." 

"Good," Ryan says. "That's good." He pauses a moment, and then he nudges Brendon in the shoulder. "Do you think we should get back?" Ryan says. 

"Maybe," Brendon agrees. 

"I nominate you to call Pete and figure out where the fuck we are," Ryan says, sitting up and yawning long and loud. "Not it." 

"We could just ask someone," Brendon says, but he's reaching for his cell phone and dialing Pete's number as he says it. 

"Are you dead?" Pete says as soon as he picks up the phone, and Brendon can hear his unspoken grin. "Patrick told me he thought you'd probably be dead if you hadn't shown up by now." 

"We got lost and went to the beach," Brendon says. He watches as Ryan idly scratches his stomach. Ryan's hips are sharp and narrow, cut into his body like unexpected handholds. Brendon wonders what it would feel like to press his palms over Ryan's sun-warmed skin. 

"Always a good plan," Pete agrees. "Where did you end up? We need to head out in a few. People to see, press to infuriate, you guys know the drill." 

"Um, see, that's the thing, " Brendon says, and starts looking around for visible landmarks that will help Pete guide them home. 

\--

In the time it takes Brendon and Ryan to get back to Pete's house, Pete has apparently decided to throw his own pre-Christmas party, judging by how it looks like Santa Claus threw up all over Pete's living room. Ryan comes to a dead halt in the middle of the doorway, leaving Brendon to crash into the back of his neck and feel like an idiot.

"What," Ryan says flatly, and Brendon has to admit that one word really sums up everything about this situation. 

"We're staying in," Pete says, adjusting the red-and-green construction paper batskull he's taped to the top of a large Douglas Fir with duct tape. "Changed my mind. You guys want to help decorate? We need to make this place look awesome by ten o' clock tonight." 

"What happens at ten?" Brendon says, when an explanation doesn't seem to be forthcoming. He thinks about asking why Pete is wearing what looks like reindeer-printed boxer briefs and nothing else, and then thinks better of it.

"The _party_ ," Pete says, in a _duh_ kind of way.

"Do we have to get half-naked to decorate?" Ryan says. His face is perfectly blank. Brendon thinks about making a Livejournal reference, and then thinks better of it, again. He's getting really good at not pointing out when people are awkwardly naked, or talking about that time Ryan posted pictures of his ass on the internet. It's almost like Brendon's been growing as a person or something.

"Who's naked?" Patrick says, and that’s when Brendon even notices he's in the room. Most of his body is shoved underneath the aforementioned Douglas Fir, and Brendon watches as he crawls carefully out from underneath the tree and wipes his fingers off on his pant legs, making a face at the sap. "Pete's not naked, he's practically fully dressed right now." 

"Right," Brendon says, when it looks like Ryan isn't going to say anything. "Uh. Anyway. We can help, I guess."

"Good," Pete says. "Party supplies list is in the kitchen. Money's on the table."

"Oh," Brendon says. He'd kind of been looking forward to helping Pete with his construction-paper monstrosity of a tree.

"No problem," Ryan says, steering Brendon by his elbow into Pete's massive open kitchen. "We'll take care of it."

"Dude," Brendon says, once they're out of sight. "I wanted to hold out for arts and crafts, why did you give in so easily?"

"No reason," Ryan says, and then he leans around the corner for a quick second look and Brendon watches as his eyes flicker from Pete to Patrick. They're talking about something else now, some aimless argument about whether or not Pete's going to burn his whole fucking house down if he puts lights on his construction-paper tree. 

"You don't think--" Brendon says, and then he closes his mouth because there's no way he can finish that sentence out loud while he's one room over from Pete and Patrick.

"Not yet," Ryan says, which doesn't really make sense, but Brendon thinks he knows what Ryan means. If Ryan means what Brendon thinks he means, anyway. Brendon grabs the list off the kitchen counter instead of trying to respond, skimming down the paper until he reaches the end, where Pete has just written OTHER EXCITING SHIT!!!!! to round things off.

"This is going to take a while," Brendon says, wondering where they're going to find a novelty kid's swimming pool on Christmas Eve.

"That might have been intentional," Ryan says. He gives the living room a pointed look.

"But you said--"

"Oh, look at the time," Ryan says, nudging Brendon towards the front door. "It's high past shut-the-fuck-up-o-clock, we should get going." 

\--

Brendon doesn't start to miss his family until well into Christmas Day, until he's sitting out on the edges of a small crowd near Pete's swimming pool, listening to Patrick play. He thinks about offering to grab another guitar to back Patrick up, but there's something perfect about his voice ringing out over his acoustic in this moment, something singular that even Brendon can appreciate. He lets himself fade away into the darkness instead, and he's not even aware of where he's going until he's almost at the entrance to Pete's bunkhouse again. 

Brendon stands in the doorway and thinks about turning around and going back to Pete's party, but there's something soft and achy in his chest and he's not sure he can fake the holiday cheer any longer. Mostly Brendon just wants to jerk off and then pass out.

He steps into the open doorway and fumbles around on the wall for the light switch, but before he can find it he hears Ryan's voice saying, "Don't." Brendon blinks into the darkness and as his eyes adjust he can just barely see where Ryan is curled up on his bottom bunk, knees pressed to his chest with his arms wrapped around them. The bunkhouse has thin, light-blue curtains and there's just enough light trickling through the fabric for Brendon to make out Ryan's expression. He doesn't look sad, exactly, but he looks like he might understand why Brendon's feeling so tender right now. 

"Hey," Brendon says, giving up on the hope of jerking off and making his way across the room towards Ryan. His foot catches on the strap of Ryan's duffle bag, and he stumbles with a hissed, "Shit, fuck, ow." When he looks back up Ryan has risen to a sitting position.

"Don't kill yourself on my bag, dumbass," Ryan says. Brendon hears, _I'm lonely and sad and no one else understands because they're all happy. No one else except you._

"I haven't so far," Brendon says, sitting down on the edge of Ryan's bed. He waits a few beats, and then, because he feels like he should, he says, "Merry Christmas."

"Fuck Christmas," Ryan says immediately. "Seriously, I hate this fucking holiday." 

"Me too," Brendon says, ignoring the fact that part of the reason he hates Christmas so much is that he used to love it so desperately. "I didn't--I wasn't feeling the party, so much." 

"It's a stupid fucking holiday," Ryan says, lifting the edge of the curtains and then letting them drift back into place. His hair has fallen into his eyes, and he looks the way he always does when he tries to arrange himself for a camera, hollow-cheeked and delicate. Brendon finds he can appreciate it more without the artifice. 

"Yeah," Brendon says uselessly. "Seriously stupid holiday, for real." Ryan looks sharp in the glow of the reflected lights and Brendon feels something in his stomach stir at being so close to him like this, quiet together in the dark. He shifts closer. There's a tangle of thoughts running through his head, memories of salty laughter and skin and sunlight. Memories of looking up into that blue, blue sky and seeing no one and nothing at all. 

Brendon licks his lips, his mouth suddenly dry. Ryan has gone silent. His eyes are large and dark and when Brendon slowly leans in, pauses a half-centimeter away, he doesn't flinch.

"Ryan," Brendon whispers, ignoring their earlier conversation entirely. Something has shifted when he wasn't looking, and now Brendon finds he doesn't give a shit about missing his family or hating versus not hating Christmas. He knows Ryan knows what he's talking about, knows it's been an unspoken thread binding them tighter and tighter together until something snaps. Brendon's been able to feel it on his skin all day, like the air between them is thicker than usual. "Before. You said it was just--it just happened." 

"Yeah," Ryan says. His eyelashes are long and delicate, flicking up and down as Ryan takes Brendon in from this new angle. "It did." 

"How," Brendon whispers and Ryan's already leaning in, already murmuring "Like this," against Brendon's parted lips as their mouths touch. 

Brendon's stomach is thick and tense, nerves prickling the backs of his hands and making his palms sweat. He thinks he might be vibrating right down to his core. Ryan's mouth slides against his, and his lips are rougher than Brendon's used to. One corner of his mouth is cracked where the skin is dry. Brendon flicks his tongue out to taste the sore spot and Ryan sucks in a surprised breath, biting down hard on Brendon's lower lip with tiny sharp teeth.

"Ow," Brendon says, but he's already leaning in again, already chasing that phantom sensation of pain. Kissing Ryan is nothing like kissing a girl. He isn't soft. He's thin and  
dangerous and Brendon just wants more, fuck whatever deity might be watching.

"You like it," Ryan says, and suddenly his hands are on Brendon's waist, fingers smoothing along the hem of Brendon's shirt and then slipping underneath to rest on his hips. Ryan's fingers have guitar calluses and that's new, too. Everything is new. 

There's a part of Brendon that seems to be sitting high above his body as they kiss, some portion of his mind that's entirely detached from the physical. Brendon watches from both angles as Ryan bites at the side of Brendon's jaw, moving lower to suck a bruise into the side of Brendon's bared neck. The distant portion of Brendon's mind keeps saying _What about Spencer? What now?_ but Brendon tells his brain to shut up and focus on the present, where Ryan's tucking one finger underneath the seam of Brendon's briefs. 

Brendon kisses back hungrily, gathering up his courage as he lets his hands trail up Ryan's sides, lets them slip underneath Ryan's t-shirt. His skin is just as warm as Brendon always imagined it would be, and Ryan shivers and pulls him closer. 

"Come on, like this," Ryan says, and shuffles forward, his mouth never leaving Brendon's parted lips. It's awkward at first, but then Ryan's laying back down on the bed and Brendon is hovering over him, and when Ryan slides his hands to Brendon's ass and pushes downward, Brendon goes willingly. A shock of heat runs up his spine when he feels how hard Ryan is. Brendon pushes his hips into Ryan's without thinking, and Ryan makes a soft, desperate noise. 

He's so hard, they're both so hard, and Brendon can't _think_ like this, can't do anything other than run his hands all over Ryan's body wherever he can reach. He feels stupid and awkward and he's pretty sure this isn't the best hook-up of Ryan's life or anything, but Ryan's cock is pressed up against Brendon's, warm even through the fabric of their jeans. Brendon rolls his hips down again, and again, seeking confirmation. He wonders if Ryan will let Brendon touch him. 

"Keep doing that," Ryan mumbles, letting his head fall back against the pillow. He's rolling his hips up in time with Brendon's thrusts, and all of him laid out like this just makes Brendon want to bite. He doesn't know where all of this is coming from--he's never had this impulse with girls, fuck, he's never really _felt_ like this with a girl. It's a damning implication, and Brendon shoves it to the back of his mind and cants his hips so he can rub the side of his cock alongside Ryan's, through the fabric of their jeans. 

"Fuck, come _on_ ," Ryan whispers, and he's tilting his head farther, pressing his hips up desperately and baring his neck like he knows what Brendon's thinking. Brendon gives in and sinks his teeth into the side of Ryan's neck, biting firmly enough that he knows it's going to leave a mark. Ryan moans underneath him, and Brendon can't help tugging on the skin with his teeth. It feels like someone has filled him up with lightning, like every atom of his body is buzzing in tandem with the roll of Ryan's hips.

He's not expecting it when Ryan pulls away and flips them over, and there's a brief, almost playful struggle that ends in Ryan pinning Brendon's wrists over his head and giving him an arch look. Ryan presses down on Brendon's wrists with the jut of his palms. Ryan's hands are right over Brendon's cut, mostly healed but still tender to the touch. It's a firm, anchoring pressure and that buzzing feeling is surging up again, making something burn low and hot in Brendon's stomach. 

It wasn't like this between Ryan and Spencer. Brendon knows what he saw, and part of what had made him ache so badly was the laughter between them, the easy way they were with each other. This isn't easy. This feels like Ryan is testing him, like he's not quite sure if Brendon is along for the ride or just trying to save face. Brendon feels like the hard line of his cock in his jeans should be answering that question for him, but maybe Ryan needs a little more confirmation. 

Brendon tugs a hand out just as Ryan's leaning down to kiss him again, slipping his tongue inside Brendon's mouth with practiced ease. Brendon rubs his hand along the flat of Ryan's stomach, and then reaches down and cups Ryan through the fabric of his jeans. Ryan hisses, biting down on Brendon's lower lip. 

"Can we--you should take your pants off," Brendon mumbles, and Ryan nods against his mouth. 

"Both of us," Ryan says, and Brendon pulls his other wrist out of Ryan's grip so he can shove at his pants and underwear. He pushes everything down to mid-thigh and then he feels weird with his shirt still on, so he tugs that off, too. Ryan follows suit, leaning back on his thighs, and Brendon watches and shifts restlessly underneath him as more and more skin is revealed. 

Ryan's cock is long and thick when he pulls it out, smeared with wetness at the tip. Brendon finds himself reaching out before he realizes it, and then he pauses, one hand coming to rest awkwardly on Ryan's hip.

"Yeah?" Ryan says, raising an eyebrow and pausing for a moment, in a rare show of compassion. He leans forward but he doesn't touch Brendon's cock, resting hard and flushed on his stomach. Brendon has a single panicked moment of _going to hell, going to HELL_ , and then he remembers that empty blue sky and he reaches his fingers out to brush over the head of Ryan's dick.

Ryan sucks in a breath through his teeth, and reaches down to close his fist around Brendon's cock. Brendon's fingers twitch helplessly over the head once Ryan's long fingers are wrapped around him, and at the first long stroke he gives up and just pumps Ryan's cock, hard and forceful. 

"Fuck, yeah, like that," Ryan whispers, and there's a thread of praise hiding underneath the words. Brendon feels desperate and pleased, all at once, and he's so hard and Ryan's fist around his cock is working him perfectly, almost exactly the way Brendon jerks himself off when he's alone. He wonders if everyone does it like that or if he and Ryan just happen to have some kind of weird masturbation symmetry, and then he's bucking his hips up as Ryan swipes a hot, wet finger over the head. 

"That's--fuck," Brendon gasps out. "Yeah, yeah, like that." Ryan nods, spitting on his fingers with one hand and then pushing them past Brendon's lips. Spit trails down Brendon's chin and he sucks as hard as he can, tongue pushing against Ryan's callouses. When Ryan pulls his fingers back they're dripping wet, and Brendon's skin feels like it's on fire. 

"I like it wet," Ryan says, just before he leans in to kiss Brendon again, and Brendon nods frantically into his mouth. 

"Me too," Brendon says, gasping for air once Ryan's slick hand closes around his cock. He can feel the spit dripping down his dick and he wants to do something other than buck and moan with his fist clenched loosely around Ryan's cock, he really does, but he's too distracted right now. Ryan's stroking him fast and hard, and Brendon's going to come like this. The hairs on his arms are standing straight up with how good it feels, Ryan's hand wet and tight and perfect. Brendon didn't know handjobs could feel like this. 

"Come on," Ryan whispers, and his voice is ragged at the edges, like watching Brendon get off on this is getting him off, too. Brendon squeezes weakly at Ryan's cock and opens his mouth for Ryan's tongue, and when Ryan swipes his tongue over the inside of Brendon's lip and then bites him, hard, Brendon bucks up with a groan and comes all over Ryan's stomach. He's never come _on_ someone before, always coming into his own hand or thin air, and the slide of Ryan's skin against the head of his dick while he's shooting is the best thing Brendon's ever felt. Ever. 

"Shit," Ryan hisses, his mouth still pressed up against Brendon's, not quite still a kiss. Brendon wants to move, wants to do _something_ , but he's still gasping for air even as Ryan groans and jerks himself off harder. His dick is sliding against Brendon's cock and the come on Brendon's stomach and Brendon can't breathe. It's all he can do to fumble a hand down there, to touch everything and anything he can reach. 

"Come on," Brendon hears himself saying, and Ryan pulls back, whining in the back of his throat. Brendon has a moment where all he can do is stare at Ryan's face, at the way his eyebrows are scrunched up and his jaw is clenched and the way it's not beautiful at all but somehow it's still everything he wants. Brendon wonders if he looks like that when he comes, drawn up tight and painful. He wonders if it's still as hot to Ryan as it is to him right now. He's never seen Ryan look so vulnerable before. 

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," Ryan says, and then he's finishing with a whine, into the mess of come and sweat and hands between them. He flops down heavily onto Brendon and Brendon has a moment of remembering that even though Ryan is tall and thin, he's still somehow much heavier. He fights for air until Ryan notices and shifts himself forward, so he's not crushing Brendon's ribcage quite so much. 

Brendon stares up at the ceiling and wonders if they're going to talk about this, and then Ryan rolls over and away, lying down on his back next to Brendon with one arm thrown over his eyes. His chest is still heaving. There's a sticky mess all over his stomach, his treasure trail, his dick. Brendon stares at it and finds himself thinking that it's really hot. He likes that he can see where he's been. 

"So," Brendon says, when the silence becomes weird and too heavy.

Ryan takes his arm away from his eyes, rolling over to face Brendon. "Yeah," Ryan says. He looks at Brendon like he's searching for something, and Brendon suddenly has the urge to kiss him. He leans in and presses his lips to Ryan's and Ryan stiffens, making a surprised noise in the back of his throat. 

_Oh_ , Brendon thinks, feeling a thread of disappointment deep down in his stomach. He pulls away.

"Wait," Ryan says, and then he's leaning over and kissing Brendon hungrily, desperate and fierce. Brendon wraps his arms around Ryan's shoulders and hangs on, until Ryan finally pulls away and leans his forehead against Brendon's.

"Spencer didn't kiss you afterwards, did he," Brendon whispers, even though he knows it's a stupid thing to say. Ryan's sharing more with him right now than he ever has, and one false move could ruin everything. 

Ryan stiffens again, and then he deflates, letting out a sigh. 

"No," Ryan whispers. "He just left."

Brendon thinks about that, about how Spencer doesn't seem like the type to have sex with someone and not kiss them afterwards. Especially not with Ryan.

"I bet he wanted to," Brendon says. "I don't think he's that kind of an asshole."

"Maybe," Ryan says. "Whatever. It doesn't matter." 

"You should try it next time and see what he does," Brendon says, and it's only then that he realizes that he's assuming there will be a next time, both for him and Ryan and for Ryan and Spencer. 

"We shouldn't do this," Ryan says. "Any of us. It's a bad idea."

"Then why did we just--"

"Because I'm stupid," Ryan says, closing his eyes and tucking his nose into Brendon's throat, his head into Brendon's shoulder. "Fuck, Brendon, I don't know. Why does anyone do anything. Because I wanted to."

"Okay," Brendon says. "Well. I wanted to, too." 

"Good for us."

"Don't be a dick," Brendon says. He's still holding Ryan awkwardly, but he can feel the way Ryan's body is getting heavier on top of him. He wonders if they're going to fall asleep like this. He can already feel the weight of gravity tugging him down. Ryan's breathing in his ear, soft and warm, and Brendon lets himself slide into unconsciousness. 

\--

"You're going to be late if you don't go and pick up Spencer now," Ryan says the next afternoon, after they've finally showered and dressed and are carefully avoiding each other's eyes. Brendon doesn't think they're fighting, exactly, but he thinks that maybe Ryan doesn't know what to do now, and Brendon doesn't either. 

"You're not coming?" Brendon says, and throws his wet towel into the tiny bathroom, aiming for the bathtub and hitting the floor. He's only his jeans and his underwear, and his wet hair’s still dripping everywhere. Pete's guest towels kind of suck. Brendon thinks that once they've made their albums and they're best friends and he's not still irrationally terrified of Pete, maybe he'll tell him to get some better fucking towels. 

"Pete and I are going to stay here and work on lyrics," Ryan says. "He's got today and tomorrow off and he says we need to get everything I have into shape. And then he wants to talk to us tonight about shit and what he needs from us this week."

Brendon blinks at him. "When did you get up?" Brendon says, because that sounds like a lot of planning that happened while he was obviously dead to the world. He'd woken up in an empty bed to the sound of the shower. He'd assumed that Ryan had woken up just before him, but apparently not.

"Ten," Ryan says. "I went and hung out with Pete for a while." 

"Right," Brendon says, and tries not to feel sulky that he obviously wasn't invited. "So you don't want to come and get Spencer? It won't take that long."

"No," Ryan says, and looks away, shoving his hands in his pockets. Brendon thinks, ah. "You do it. I'm going to stay here. It's not like we don't basically all live together. I can survive not going to the airport with you." 

"If that's what you want," Brendon says. He tugs a t-shirt on and jams his feet into flip flops, fumbling around in his jeans from yesterday for his keys and his phone and his wallet. They're going to have to go shopping while they're out here, or they're going to have to bum some clothes off of Pete or something. Brendon only brought two pairs of jeans, and now one of them is covered in jizz. He wonders if he has anything stashed away in the van. Maybe an extra t-shirt or something. 

Spencer's waiting for him with a duffle bag and a shit-eating grin on his face when Brendon pulls up to the domestic flight terminal in the mini-van. 

"Dude," Brendon says, once Spencer's thrown his bag in the back and hopped into the passenger seat. "I am so jealous of your clean clothes right now. Ryan and I are going to have to go buy new ones or something. Did you get anything sweet for Christmas?" 

"Some stuff," Spencer says, kicking his heels up on the dashboard. "But whatever, you know what's better than random presents? Staying in fucking LA for a week." He's grinning ear to ear, and Brendon can't help but think that he's missed that smile, even though it's only been a day. Sometimes Brendon thinks that being around Spencer is like being near the sun; he just wants to soak him up, roll around in him, which is a weird thing to think about someone who isn't even Brendon's best friend. Or--well. Spencer might be Brendon's best friend, but Spencer's best friend is Ryan. Brendon's pretty clear on that. 

"Seriously, though," Brendon says. "I think our options are washing our clothes, or buying new clothes. Maybe we should just wash them." It's not like Brendon's particularly concerned about cleanliness, but they have to go out and meet people all week and he'd rather not do it smelling like spunk and three-day-old cheeseburgers.

"I brought you guys your stuff," Spencer says, and motions over his shoulder to his stuffed duffle bag. "I just grabbed whatever you guys left at my house. And dude, why were your boxers in the basement?"

"They were?" Brendon says, blinking. "Uh. Oh, shit, that one time we went swimming, remember? I think I just wore your swim trunks home."

"Oh, okay. Anyway. My mom washed it all, so you guys are set for a little while. And maybe Pete will give us some Clan stuff to wear." 

"I hope so," Brendon says, flicking on his blinker so he can move into the passing lane on the freeway. "That would be awesome." When he steps back and takes a moment he can't really believe this is his life right now, and from Spencer's satisfied smile and the way he's tapping his ankle against Brendon's dashboard, he can't either. 

"Where's Ryan?" Spencer says, looking over at Brendon, suddenly serious for a moment. "He didn't want to come?"

"He's working with Pete on lyrics," Brendon says, because it seems easier than getting into everything here, in the car, when he's not even sure what he's going to say to Spencer or how he'll react. He doesn't know if he should tell Spencer that he saw them, or if he should tell him what happened with Ryan. He just doesn't know anything right now, and Brendon thinks that maybe this is what growing up feels like. It's the sensation of not spewing every single thought that comes out of his mouth at exactly the wrong person. 

"Oh," Spencer says. "Well, that's good. We need lyrics." His tone is carefully neutral.

"Yeah," Brendon says, and keeps his eyes on the road. "Lyrics."

\-- 

Pete's room is covered in empty food bowls and crushed Red Bull cans when Spencer and Brendon walk in, with Pete and Ryan at the center of the tornado, surrounded by scraps of paper. Hemmy barks uncontrollably until he recognizes Brendon and Spencer, at which point he runs over to slobber on Spencer's knee and paw at him until Spencer reaches down to shake hands.

"Hey," Ryan says, blinking like he's just come out of a daze. Pete stands up and hugs Spencer, but he also looks a bit like someone had just woken him up from a deep sleep.

"It's good to have you back out here, man," Pete says, and Ryan nods, still looking at Spencer. He doesn't get up to hug him, and Brendon tries not to wince. Normally he would stay far, far away from any problems between Ryan and Spencer, but this seems like the kind of thing they need to fix before it digs in any deeper. 

"We're sort of," Pete says, and gives an awkward laugh. 

Spencer nods. "Do your thing," he says, giving Ryan a significant look, one that obviously means something but which Brendon can't quite read. "We won't interrupt. We can amuse ourselves for the afternoon." 

"I need to talk to all of you at some point tonight about the Clan stuff," Pete says. "We'll call you when we're finished up?"

"Sounds good," Brendon says, and he sticks his hands in his pockets and follows Spencer out. 

"So," Brendon says, looking at Spencer. His smile has wilted slightly, but he still looks pretty happy to be here. His hair is a mess, pushed into his eyes and scrunched up in the back of his head from the flight. He looks like he slept on the plane. "What should we do?"

"No fucking clue," Spencer says. "We should find one of Pete's laptops and look shit up. Maybe we can go to the tar pits or something. Or the beach."

"Ryan and I went to the beach," Brendon says. "It was pretty sweet. I don't know if I could find my way back there, though. We got lost on the way in and we were coming from a different direction." 

"We should all go back together," Spencer says. "It's more fun that way." 

"Here," Brendon says, tugging a MacBook that's been left open on Pete's kitchen island towards them. "Let's just google "Cheap shit to do in Los Angeles.'" He types it into the search bar, and Spencer leans over his shoulder as Brendon scrolls down through the results. Most of them sound kind of fun but also boring, like driving down Mulholland Drive or going and taking pictures with the sign. But--

"There," Spencer says, stabbing a finger at the computer screen and accidentally smudging it. Brendon is suddenly aware of how close Spencer is, of how he can smell both Spencer's deodorant and his shampoo when he's pressed along Brendon's back like this. "The tar pits are totally not that expensive. We can use our student IDs. Let's go."

"Dinosaurs are the shit," Brendon agrees. "Hell yes. Let's go see some bones." 

"Rawr," Spencer agrees solemnly, making T-Rex arms as they head out towards the van. 

\--

"So this isn't about dinosaurs, is it," Brendon says, after they've both spent ten minutes staring at a diorama that explains the history of the Tar Pits. It's chilly in the air conditioned museum, cold enough to prick the hairs on Brendon's forearms.

"Apparently not," Spencer says, nodding at the image of a large, angry Mastodon in front of them. "Still kind of cool though."

"Still pretty awesome," Brendon agrees. He's not going to complain about giant prehistoric animal bones, even if they weren't the ones he was expecting. The museum isn't particularly crowded, which makes sense because it's the day after Christmas. Brendon sees his fair share of harried parents and tired kids wandering around the exhibits, but thankfully there's still lots of breathing room.

"That's a ground sloth," Spencer says, after they've both stared at its skeleton for two minutes and come up with nothing. There's really nothing else to say. It's a giant ground sloth, what the fuck.

"Yup," Brendon says. He crosses his arms and tilts his head, like if he looks at it a different way then maybe it will come to life. 

"Come on, the mammoth thing is over here," Spencer says, tugging on Brendon's wrist. He wraps his long fingers around Brendon's wrist when he does it, like always, and Brendon feels that strange spark that he generally tries to push down whenever Spencer touches him like that. Spencer's very tactile with him--with both of them, really. He doesn't touch other people a lot but he always touches Brendon and Ryan. Brendon wonders if maybe that's weird. If maybe he should have noticed before now that even though he's only known Spencer for barely six months, Spencer already touches him the same way he touches Ryan--a hand on Brendon's hip to steer him forward, fingers around Brendon's wrist when he wants Brendon to go somewhere, a hand rubbing absently at the small of Brendon's back when he's upset or frustrated. 

"It's a mastodon," Brendon says dumbly. The tusks are stretching out up over his head, up and away, like a strange bone-bird taking flight. Spencer's hand is warm on his wrist. 

"Right," Spencer says. "A mastodon." 

"Yeah," Brendon says.

"What's a mastodon," Spencer says, after a beat, still staring up at the gigantic tusks.

"I should have known they wouldn't teach you this stuff in Catholic school," Brendon says. "You said it already. It's a mammoth, dumbass."

"Apparently not," Spencer says, finally reading the informational sign next to the skeleton. "I guess the tusks are different or something. And they ate different things."

"Okay," Brendon says, because that's all he can think to say to that particular piece of information.

They wander through the rest of the museum, stopping for a few moments to watch the paleontologists work behind a large glass fishbowl of a central workroom. Brendon watches a girl with dark hair carefully clean a large bone, tattoos peeking out from underneath her white lab coat. Being someone who cleans mastodon bones for a living sounds simultaneously cool and boring. Brendon thinks he would probably break them, if given the chance, so maybe it's better that he's going into music. 

Spencer's hand is still wrapped loosely around Brendon's wrist when they arrive at the actual tar pits, which seem to be exactly as advertised and not particularly exciting. They wander on, Spencer segueing into his ideas for the drum part on one of Ryan's new songs and Brendon listening and nodding along as they make their way through the rest of the exhibits. 

" Hey, you don't think Ryan and Pete are, uh--" Spencer says suddenly, in the middle of a digression about something Patrick had played for him the other day.

"What?" Brendon says. "No. No way."

"I just--okay," Spencer says, and taps his thumbs nervously on the top of the signboard that informs them that this tar pit was one of the original tar pits which prompted the founding of the museum. "Right. That was dumb. Forget I said that." 

"Ryan and Pete aren't like that," Brendon says, trying frantically to think about how to word his next sentences without letting something slip out. "They're just writing together. Ryan said he thinks that Pete and Patrick are, um," Brendon says. He doesn't know how to explain what Ryan thinks about Pete and Patrick, because it's not like Ryan ever uses words to describe things, except when he's writing overly complicated lyrics. 

"Oh," Spencer says. 

"Yeah." 

"I mean, I always knew that--"

"Right, it kind of makes sense--" Brendon says, and they talk over each other for a moment until they're both grinning helplessly at one another. 

"That's cool," Spencer says finally. "I hope it works out. For both of them."

"Yeah," Brendon says. "Me too." 

\--

"What's your biggest fear?" Spencer says, pulling open his bag of potato chips with a flourish while preparing to dive into one of the largest subs either of them has ever seen. Brendon and Spencer had both ordered their own and then switched halves for more variety, but Brendon's starting to think they should have split one sandwich and called it done. When Spencer holds it up, his sandwich is seriously the size of his head. 

"What?" Brendon says, shaking himself out of all thoughts of sub-related complications. His sub is only slightly less massive, but he's making it easier on himself by picking some of the lunch meat out first so he can actually get his mouth around the damn thing. 

"Some stupid thing I was reading on the plane," Spencer says. "You know, self-help bullshit. It was like, try to think about your biggest fear and think really long and hard about it, and then think about how you would feel if you didn't have that fear, and then it went on for a while and I got bored." 

"Right."

"So what's yours?" Spencer says. "Because I know mine. But I had to think about it really hard to come up with it." 

"It used to be the idea of not being able to enter the Kingdom with my family," Brendon says slowly. "But I don't believe in that anymore."

Spencer nods. "Mine is that we don't make it," he says, and for a moment he looks lost. "We don't make it, and I have to go away to college and I'll probably still major in music management or something, but--" He toys with a pickle that has slid out of the side of his sandwich, popping it into his mouth with a grimace. "I really want this to work," Spencer says quietly. 

"Yeah," Brendon says. "I think I'm gay." 

Spencer stares at him for a moment, paused in the act of chewing his pickle. He swallows carefully and then takes a sip from the straw of his fountain cup, his eyes never leaving Brendon's face. 

"You asked what my greatest fear was," Brendon says, unsteadily. "And it was saying that out loud. Don't tell anyone." 

"Are you sure?" Spencer says.

"Yeah," Brendon says. "Pretty sure. I mean, whatever, maybe I'm bi, but I'm--pretty sure. About the 'guys' part of it." 

"Okay," Spencer says. He looks out the window, not meeting Brendon's eyes.

Brendon's heart is racing. His fingers and toes are tingling, and his stomach feels like it's dropping ten stories. It's weird, because he'd thought that maybe he'd feel better once he said it out loud, but instead it's like he's unlocked a door and now all of a sudden every feeling he's ever had is pouring out.

"You're cool with it?" Brendon says. 

"Cool with it?" Spencer huffs, scrubbing his palm over his face, rubbing at his temples like he's trying to massage away a headache. He's still not looking Brendon in the face. "Yeah. I'm cool with it." 

"Okay."

"You seriously don't know?"

"No? What? What don't I know?"

"I'm--okay, this is going to sound like I'm just trying to make you feel better, but I promise I'm not."

"Sure," Brendon says. "I believe you."

"So am I," Spencer says. 

It shouldn't be a shock to Brendon but somehow it still is, like his brain had managed to convince him that Spencer was just playing around all along. He bites his lip, then chews on his plastic straw. "Seriously?"

"Oh yeah," Spencer says, squinting in the sunlight coming in through the panes of thick window glass. He grins humorlessly. "Really fucking gay. Couldn’t care less about girls. It's kind of a problem." 

"Oh," Brendon says.

"Wait, I didn't mean it like that," Spencer says quickly, as Brendon looks away. "Not that it's a problem in general. I'm okay with it. I really am. There's just--other problems. With guys. Or with one guy in particular. That's what I meant."

Brendon nods as he takes another large bite of his sandwich. He's lost his appetite, but he keeps eating anyway, shoveling food into his mouth in the hopes that when he's done everything will make more sense. 

"So, uh, what's the problem?" Brendon says, even though he thinks he already knows. "This guy isn't into you?"

"I can't tell," Spencer says. "It's stupid, it's all a big fucking mess. It's--we hooked up, before, a while ago. And I figured he was just trying it out and that was it, and then we hooked up again, and I just don't know if he's fucking with me, or what."

"Why would he be fucking with you?" Brendon asks. 

"Because he keeps telling me he's straight," Spencer says humorlessly. "Or that he doesn't know. And like, whatever, I get it, it's confusing. But I really don't--want him to be," Spencer finishes quietly, and Brendon's heart is burning in his chest, a bright spot of misery that's aching for release. He takes a deep breath, and hopes that maybe when this is all over, he can go back to being a third wheel without so much sudden pain attached. Spencer looks beautiful like this, even through his uncertainty; his hair is tipped with gold in the light of the afternoon sun, and his forearms are long and lean and bare. He and Ryan are going to be a beautiful couple. Brendon hopes the band won't screw them up too much. 

He bites his lip and says, "Ryan's really sad that you didn't kiss him. I think he likes you more than he realizes. I think you guys both want the same thing."

Spencer's eyes widen. "He told you?" 

"I saw you guys," Brendon says quietly. "I'm really sorry. And then Ryan and I sort of---" he waves his hand, trying to figure out a way to say _had all the gay sex_ without saying it out loud. "I think he was just trying to help me out because he knew I was confused," Brendon says, determined to take all of the blame. "Don't get mad at him. You guys would be good together. If he decides he's not straight. I'm sorry." 

There's a long silence after his words, and Brendon chances a look across the table. To his surprise, Spencer doesn't look angry or upset; he looks like he's thinking about something, turning it over and over in his mind until he can map all the edges and see all the points of failure. 

"Huh," is all Spencer says, eventually. He picks up his sandwich and then puts it back down, and then thinks better of it and shoves the rest of it in his mouth, chewing loudly. 

"You're not--mad?" Brendon says hesitantly, opening his bag of chips with a _pop!_ of compressed air. 

Spencer swallows, and then he takes another sip of his soda. "No," he says eventually, and he sounds just as quietly surprised as Brendon feels. "I'm not." 

"Okay. Good?"

"Yeah. I think so."

"Okay," Brendon asks. He pauses. "Shouldn't you be punching me right now? Is that even normal?"

"I think maybe in this case it is," Spencer says. He stands up, stretching out his back with a loud pop, and as he does so his shirt rides up and Brendon thinks, _oh my god, is Spencer flirting with me? No, he can't be flirting with me_. Part of him feels like he should still feel guilty, but if he's honest with himself he's been waiting for Spencer to flirt with him for approximately forever. Maybe Spencer's just giving into that same feeling that Brendon keeps stumbling into out here, that feeling of endless possibility and no rules and no regrets. 

"You and Ryan, you should, um," Brendon says. "You should talk to each other."

"I know," Spencer says. His voice is soft and he looks more fragile, suddenly, as they carry their trash over to the garbage can. "I think I'm going to try and talk to him tonight." 

"Good idea," Brendon says, and wonders if he even knows what he's feeling right now. He doesn't think it's an emotion that's ever been written down in any book or placed on any map.

"Yeah," Spencer says. As his crumpled napkins and empty ketchup packets slide down into the garbage can off his beat-up plastic tray, Spencer's phone rings in his pocket. Brendon plucks it out without thinking, his fingers brushing the seams of Spencer's jeans.

"Welcome to Smith's House of Pizza, pickup or delivery?"

"Delivery," Pete says. "Think you can be back here in an hour? Because otherwise the pizzas are going to beat you here." 

"Holy shit, I'm so totally psychic," Brendon says. "Also yeah, I think so. We might have to stop for gas."

"Hey, it's up to you," Pete says. "You'll be the one eating cold pizza." 

"Right," Brendon says. He pushes his balled-up napkins into the trash, and then jingles his keys in his hand. "We're on our way." 

\--

Pete's kitchen island is piled high with pizza boxes when Brendon and Spencer arrive, but from the sights and sounds of the carnage Brendon is pretty sure the pizzas have only been there for a couple of minutes. He elbows Patrick and Ryan out of the way to have a chance to grab a few slices of veggie, and then he leans up against the kitchen island, stacking his slices up so he can eat them all at once, giant sandwiches be damned. Brendon is never going to turn down free pizza.

"You can't do this in Maryland," Patrick threatens, but he looks just as happy as they fill their stomachs with melted cheese. 

"I won't," Brendon says, but it comes out as "Mrpgh murple."

"You better not," Patrick says. "Or I will come out to Maryland and kick your ass." 

"Aren't you coming out anyway?" Ryan says, from next to Brendon's elbow.

"Yeah," Patrick says. "But in this case I would be coming out _specifically_ to kick Brendon's ass."

"He packs a mean right hook," Pete says, tilting his head back so he can properly appreciate the joys of a molten Meat-Lover's slice. Patrick rolls his eyes as Pete groans in appreciation, and then makes a high-pitched squealing noise when he burns the roof of his mouth. 

"Maybe if you blew on it it wouldn't be hot, dumbass."

"Dick joke," Pete says, grinning through the pain and gulping down the rest of Patrick's bottle of Aquafina.

"Oh shut up," Patrick says, and Brendon blinks.

"What?"

"He's given up on making dick jokes because he's lazy," Patrick says. "Now he's just going to say 'dick joke,' whenever he would normally make one."

"Does that happen a lot?" Spencer says, even though he sounds like he already knows the answer.

"You tell me," Patrick says. "Count how many times he says it in the next twenty-four hours and let me know." 

"I make them more when you're in the room," Pete says, leaning over to press a sloppy kiss to Patrick's temple. Patrick's eyes flutter closed for a fraction of a second, a small smile on his face. Then he shoves Pete off, but Brendon knows what he just saw. 

"Come on," Pete says, grabbing his fourth slice from a nearby open box. "Living room. Important team-building session. Increase your workplace productivity and all that shit."

"We don't have any productivity," Ryan says. 

"You will," Pete promises, and then he picks up the remote which controls his media center. Brendon blinks as the lights go down and Pete's projector fires up.

"You have...a powerpoint?" Spencer says incredulously. The bartskull is staring at them in large neon pink from five feet away.

"I made it myself," Pete promises. "It doesn't have stupid business talk in it. Just what you can do and what you can't do and what I will do if you steal my merch and who to call if Godzilla shows up and stuff."

"Is that an actual slide?" Ryan says, and then he grins one of his rare, true smiles. "What to do if Godzilla shows up in LA?"

"Wait and see," Pete says. 

\--

"I think I'm going to need a hand-out," is all Brendon can come up with after Pete's presentation. Or "presentation," really, since he's not sure which parts of it were important and true and which parts were Pete fucking with them. He's pretty sure that Clan doesn't have a top secret lab or a secret government agenda to further world peace and general coolness, but he's also never going to remember all those names and numbers that Pete just threw at them. 

"I stopped by the office and grabbed some new employee packages," Pete says, digging in his bag until he finds three dog-eared stacks of papers. He hands one to each of them and Brendon flips through the paperwork, raising an eyebrow. 

"Do we have to fill all of this out?"

"By the time you leave," Pete says, shrugging. "Almost everyone's on vacation this week, so no one's going to process it until next week anyway. But basically this is the deal - we have four big events lined up this week, three of which I can't attend. You've got two daytime merch showcase booths at lifestyle events on Monday and Tuesday, FBR is sponsoring a local holiday Battle-of-the-Bands in Santa Monica on Wednesday night, and Thursday is New Year's Eve and I'm hosting a New Year's Eve party with the rest of the guys at the Hard Rock Hotel," Pete says. "We'll have staff for that, but it's always good to have extra. We might not have you guys do merch for that night--I'm not sure yet. We might need you to dress up and guest DJ for a track or two so we can hype you guys up a bit. Maybe even play a clip of one of the demos as a fade-in to get things rolling."

"Sure," Brendon says, and tries to act like this is all no big deal, of course, if he absolutely has to he can dress up on New Year's Eve and guest DJ on Pete's set to premiere his band's new song. Right. It's going to be such a hardship. Brendon's life is tough.

"Monday is tomorrow," Ryan points out quietly, like he's not quite ready to deal with what Pete just said so he's going to pretend it didn't happen until further notice. "Who's going to give us the merch and stuff? And tell us what to do? I mean, the powerpoint..." He trails off, and Spencer nods next to him, agreeing with Ryan's silent implication that the powerpoint managed to talk a lot about selling merch without actually going into the finer points of how to sell merch. 

"We'll go over it before you get dropped off tomorrow," Pete promises. "I won't just drop you in and let you drown."

"Okay," Spencer says, but he doesn't sound convinced.

"Promise," Pete says again. "But for now you guys should just read that stuff and maybe fill it out and give it back to me. And I have some phone calls to make, so--" He makes the international sign for 'back in a few,' and wanders off, pulling his phone out as he goes. 

Brendon waits a beat--two beats--before turning to Ryan and Spencer on the couch.

"Oh, no big deal," Brendon says, keeping his voice admirably steady. "Just, whatever. Could we maybe dress up and premiere our demo and shit on Thursday?"

"In Hollywood," Ryan says, and his eyes are large and round. "At the Hard Rock Cafe." 

"During Pete's DJ set," Spencer says, and Brendon feels like there's an elastic cord winding the three of them together, keeping their emotions tightly under wraps until they can run around the bunkhouse and scream for joy until it all makes sense. He reaches his hand out impulsively and grabs Ryan's fingers, curling them around his own. 

Brendon realizes a second later that maybe grabbing Ryan's hand was a loaded statement, but then Ryan is squeezing back and simultaneously wrapping the fingers of his other hand into Spencer's, interlocking together like two sets of puzzle-pieces. 

"Hooooollllly shit," Brendon says, drawing out the vowel in a high and thready voice until both Ryan and Spencer crack and break out into smiles. They're sitting on Pete's couch, all of them holding hands, and Brendon feels like his world has been turned sideways and shaken upside down since he set out for LA, each moment a little farther from his old world than the last. 

"We should do makeup," Ryan says. "I'm going to do your makeup. Can I do your makeup? Wait, no, I'm not asking you. I'm telling. I'm going to do your makeup." 

"Ugh," Spencer says, making a face. "I hate it when you stick that stuff near my eyes."

"But it looks so good on you," Ryan says. "Come on, you heard what Pete said. We need to dress up." 

"You can do my makeup," Brendon says, since ever since the first day he noticed Ryan wearing eyeliner he's always kind of wondered how he would look in it.

"Really?" Ryan says, turning back to face him with a pleased expression. "Sweet."

"Fine," Spencer says, rolling his eyes. "If Brendon's doing it, I guess." 

\--

After the screaming in the bunk house--after all the yelling and the joy and that one ill-advised backflip Brendon had attempted in the middle of the room--things suddenly and painfully become super awkward. That's when Brendon remembers that maybe everything isn't as fixed as it had seemed a few hours ago, with the three of them trying to contain their excitement in Pete's living room. Ryan's staring at Spencer's shoes with his hands shoved in his pockets and Spencer is very carefully staring at no one at all, and Brendon suddenly remembers that Ryan and Spencer haven't talked to each since that one time they had sex in Pete's pool three days ago.

"I'm going to, uh," Brendon says, and makes a spectacularly graceless exit. It might be his most awkward ever, but he doesn't really have a choice. Ryan and Spencer need to fix whatever's going on between them if they're all going to have a chance to make it as a band. 

Brendon shoves his hands into his pockets, an unconscious echo of Ryan. He wonders what to do with the rest of his evening. If he stays out here--in the glow of Pete's patio lights, with the pool to the left and the Hollywood Hills in the distance--he'll be able to hear everything. He can't decide if that's a good thing or not. 

Brendon scuffs the toe of his sneaker along the burnished stone tiles of Pete's winding backyard walkway, and then he walks over to the side of Pete's pool and sits down on the edge. The water is still and calm beneath him, and through Pete's glass windows he can see most of the interior of the house, dark and quiet. There's a light on the kitchen, near the stove, and someone has left the television on. 

Ryan's voice drifts back from the bunkhouse, but Brendon can't quite hear what he's saying. He tips his head back up to look at the stars, but all he can see is a wash of pale neon, the same as Vegas. Even on Pete's mountain, there are no stars here. There's probably a lesson in there somewhere, if he still believed in lessons.

Brendon stands up and kicks off his flip-flops, then his jeans, tugging them by the ankles when they catch on his knees. He pulls off his t-shirt and his glasses and then he pauses when he gets to his underwear. There's no one around, and the house is calm and still. A thrill of illicit joy runs up his spine, and then he slips them off, tossing them on the pile. 

The only appropriate thing in this circumstance is a cannonball, and Brendon patters over to diving board in bare feet, feeling oddly excited. It feels like he's getting away with something, even though he knows that swimming naked in Pete's pool is nothing to write home about. The breeze on his skin is warm and sweet. Brendon feels--sexy. He doesn't think he's ever felt sexy before. 

Brendon runs off the diving board and into the pool, splashing water everywhere on his landing. He sinks to the bottom and then shoots up, gasping for air, trying to resist the urge to laugh. 

The water on his bare skin makes him feel shivery and oversensitive. It's nothing like being in the bathtub. Brendon doesn't know why, but this is different. Another jolt of arousal shoots up his spine, and he dives under again, chasing the sensation of the trailing water against his skin. 

Brendon swims laps until his legs and chest ache with a solid, satisfying burn. He leans up against the side of the pool and tries to catch his breath, his chest heaving in the night air. The bunkhouse is still and silent. He doesn't know what that means. Part of him wants to call for Ryan and Spencer and tell him to come out here, tell them to strip down and join him and feel what he's feeling right now. Brendon is rock-hard against his own thigh. He needs to come. 

Pete's hot tub is covered with the black vinyl cover that always stays on when it's not in use, but Joe's shown them how to take it off and store it away, how to turn the lights and the bubbles on and how not to scald themselves in the process. Brendon lifts himself out of the pool and sets everything up, glancing every so often at the large picture windows of Pete's house. Every time he does so it feels like a bolt of lightning runs up his spine--it's a chorus of _they could see you, someone could see you_ , and it goes straight to his cock. He's thought about doing something like this before--how could he not, after seeing Ryan and Spencer--but actually doing it feels even better than he'd imagined. 

The water is almost perfect when he slides in. Brendon bites his lip at the sensation of the bubbles and the foam, rolling and tickling on his bare skin. He pushes his hips forward involuntarily, trying to chase the feeling. It feels like something is touching him, stroking feather-light hands over his skin. It's intoxicating. 

It would be better if Ryan and Spencer were out here, Brendon thinks, and then tips his head against the lip of the tub and lets his eyes fall closed. He slides his hand down his stomach, rubbing over his hips and his balls and between his legs before finally taking himself in hand. He's so hard, and it feels amazing, and Brendon can't remember the last time he was this turned on. Or wait, yes he can, because it was with Ryan.

Brendon rubs his fingers around the head of his cock and thinks about Spencer, thinks about Ryan-and-Spencer-AND-Brendon, as though such a thing were even possible. He can barely imagine how it would work but just the thought of it sends heat shooting up his spine, and makes him arch into his own hand. He thinks about watching them, about being invited in, about not having to stay on the sidelines. Touching Ryan had been so good, and _kissing_ Ryan had been so good, and Brendon can't even really imagine what it would be like with Spencer, who he's apparently had a crush on for approximately forever. He's never seen Spencer totally naked but he's seen in him a bathing suit plenty of times, watched him change in pool houses and in Spencer's bedroom. Brendon thinks that maybe he should have realized before now what all those sneaked looks were about, because he was never able to stop staring. Spencer's body is long and lean but stronger than Ryan's, in a way that makes Brendon think about Spencer holding him down. He's tall and pretty and he has the most amazing ass that Brendon's ever seen, even if Brendon had been futilely trying to look away at the time. 

Brendon jerks himself slower and thinks about what it would be like to touch all of that skin. He lets himself fall back into that moment, that day they changed to go swimming down at the rec pool in Spencer's neighborhood. He lets the memory change and shift so that all of a sudden Spencer is just pushing down his shorts and tugging them off, and then turning around to kiss Brendon. All of his smooth skin is pressed up against Brendon's body, and his hands are on Brendon's hips, and Brendon moans quietly as he imagines the way the tip of his cock would feel when he rubbed it up against Spencer's stomach. 

He tightens his grip and increases his strokes, no longer certain that he's going to last. Spencer's going to his knees in Brendon's fantasy, and then Brendon adds Ryan to the mix, lets him walk in on them. It gives Brendon that same feeling that's pulsing through his veins right now, that sense of being discovered, of shame bright and hot in his belly. He wants to be found out. 

He wants Spencer to take his hips with a firm, punishing grip and suck him down, letting Brendon know who's in charge. He wants Ryan to--to tug his clothing off, all that pale, delicate skin, and to cross the room and kiss Brendon just as desperately as he did that other night. He wants Spencer to get him off and then make him pay for it, and he wants Ryan to come all over Brendon's cock again--maybe even while it was sliding in and out of Spencer's mouth--

Brendon comes with a low groan, biting down on his fist so no one will hear him and come to investigate. He sinks down into the bubbles, feeling flushed and overheated. His hips are still jerking up helplessly even as he leans against the side of the tub to try and catch his breath.

He wants to feel weird about what he just did, but all he feels is a vague sense of inevitability, like this is something that began a long time ago and is only just now revealing itself to each of them. He wants to blame California for turning the key and unlocking all of their secrets, and maybe he should. Maybe it's something in the air. 

\--

The next afternoon, Spencer takes a long drag of his soda and pronounces, "This is less cool than I thought it would be."

"I think Ryan might disagree with you," Brendon says, nodding over to where Ryan is talking and flirting with a pack of three very blonde scene girls. They're seated behind a folding table in uncomfortably creaky chairs, but at least they have shade. It had taken them at least an hour to figure out how to put up the pop-up canopy this morning, but now Brendon's grateful that they did. It's so hot that his T-shirt is soaked through, even though it's black so no one can tell. 

"Ryan needs attention," Spencer says, flicking at a peeling price sticker on the side of the table. They're surrounded by piles of merch in boxes, stacks of it on the table, and while it feels awesome to be on the inside for once, the reality of it is that Brendon's stuck here for the next eight hours and he's already bored. 

"I guess," Brendon says. He thinks that out of the two of them, he probably needs more attention than Ryan, but he keeps his mouth shut. He raises an eyebrow at Spencer instead, trying to telegraph _Are you jealous?_ without having to say it out loud. He still doesn't know what happened between them last night, but so far all signs point to positive. He's trying not to think about what that might mean.

"Shut up," Spencer says, in response to Brendon's expression. He flicks Brendon on the funny bone, hard enough to sting. "I'm not fucking jealous, shut up." 

"If you say so," Brendon says. He stands up, cracking his back and relishing the pop. His stomach rumbles loudly. He tosses his water bottle at a nearby trash can, and misses. 

"Good job," Spencer says, and then he's distracted by a group of kids that look like they're heading their way. They're whispering about something, and Spencer stands up and smiles at them invitingly. Brendon knows that Spencer is about to work his charm and talk up their band, and he really should stay and do the same but he's _starving_. 

"I'm going to go get some food," Brendon says, and Spencer nods. "I'll be right back."

"Get me something," Spencer says, and then he's saying hello to a tall girl with glasses and a lip ring. 

Brendon slips out the back of their canopy tent, fishing around in his pockets until he's certain he has the twenty Pete gave each of them this morning. It's supposed to last for today and tomorrow and Brendon's not quite sure how that's going to work. 

He plucks his sunglasses off the collar of his t-shirt and slips them on, and then goes to find something to eat. If it were up to him he'd go and watch the skateboarding demonstrations all afternoon, but he passes them by and instead heads for the food tents. He's debating between two slices of cheese and a bucket full of fried chicken for him and Spencer when someone taps him on the shoulder. 

"Hey," the girl says, and Brendon blinks. She's hot. Like--really hot.

"Hey," Brendon says. 

"Weren't you working the merch booth for FBR?" the girl asks, and smiles at him. 

Brendon nods, trying to play it cool. "Yeah," Brendon says. "I'm with the label." He gives himself a mental high-five because holy shit, _it's true_ , and fuck, Brendon is _such_ a baller. Oh man.

"Yeah?" the girl says, and brushes her hair out of her eyes. It's shortish, dark and spiky. It looks good on her. "So you work with all the artists and stuff?"

"I'm--one of the artists," Brendon says. "We got signed a few months ago. Pete has us out here working on our record."

"You know Pete Wentz?" 

"Yeah, I'm staying at his house," Brendon says, and then realizes maybe he shouldn't have said that when the girl's eyes light up.

"That's awesome," the girl says, and she's playing it cool but Brendon knows that look, because it was exactly how he felt when Ryan said that Pete was coming out to see them play. Adoration and excitement, tamped down into something that looks a lot like disinterest.

"Yeah, he's a good guy," Brendon says, and seizes the opportunity to talk up the band. He tells her about Panic!, and about Spencer and Ryan, and he tries to listen to what she says in return but he's really distracted by her rack. He thinks she might be the most attractive girl to ever show interest in him. 

"What are you guys doing later?" the girl says. "Maybe you could come by? I could invite some people over."

"To--your house?" Brendon says.

"My parent's house," the girl says. "They're on vacation. You guys could come hang out with me and some of my friends." There's a slight emphasis on the word friends that Brendon takes to mean, _they will all be girls who want to sleep with you because you're on Pete Wentz's label_.

"Yeah," Brendon says, and tries to make eye contact. He doesn't know what to do. A small part of him wants to say yes, because it's not every day that a super hot girl offers to sleep with him. But--he just isn't that into it, when he really thinks about it. He doesn't know why, but something in him is telling him to say no, and he doesn't think it's a newfound sense of morality. She's pretty like a painting, like something that Brendon taught himself a long time ago that he should want.

Jesus, he really _is_ gay.

"Give me your number and maybe we can come by," Brendon says, instead of a straight answer. The girl takes out a sharpie and writes "Kristina" and her number on Brendon's forearm, and then she winks at him and walks away. Brendon looks down at the thick lines of black and before he can even think about it he's running his thumb over them, smearing them with his own sweat until they're mostly unrecognizable.

"Oh well," Brendon says out loud, in case anyone's listening. "Too bad." The guy behind the pizza counter snorts at him, hiding a grin, and Brendon suddenly decides that he wants cheese pizza after all. 

"What's on your arm?" Ryan says, once Brendon's back at their merch booth with a slice for each of them and another bottle of water. Brendon looks down at the smeared lines, with the girl's name just visible underneath the mess. 

"Someone made me an offer," Brendon says. "I wasn't that into it." 

"Yeah," Ryan says, chowing down on his pizza. He sets it down for a moment and then pulls out a handful of crumpled receipts from his back pocket, each one with a name and phone number. "Me either."

\--

The day slides by, determined to muddle through at its own pace no matter how much Brendon wishes it would speed up a little. He spends at least three solid hours talking up their band to scene kids, pushing himself to keep going and keep smiling even when he's itchy and restless. He just wants to play some fucking hacky sack or walk around or do _something_. He's apparently not very good at just sitting around and chatting with people. 

They start packing up when the sunlight starts to fade, and by the time someone from the label shows up to collect them, they're ready to go with everything packed, shipped, and stowed away. They load it all into the van and get dropped off back at the office, where they all pile into Brendon's van. 

"So," Brendon says, starting the engine. "What should we do tonight?" 

"I dunno," Ryan says, but he's turning around to look at Spencer in the backseat, having some sort of complicated conversation with him without words.

"Let's just go back to Pete's," Spencer says. "I'm beat. We should just hang out and watch movies or something." 

"Uh," Brendon says. "Okay?" He doesn't tell them that he feels like he needs to go run a few miles, like he's going to jump out of his skin if something exciting doesn't happen soon. He gets like this sometimes, always has. He knows there's no cure for it except to tire himself out until he crashes. He doubts he's going to sleep tonight. Maybe he can hang out with Pete and they can be insomniacs together. 

Joe and Andy are sitting outside in lawn chairs when they pull up, feet kicked up on a cooler and shirts off and beverages of choice in their hands. 

"Hey?" Ryan says, as they walk across Pete's lawn. "What's...up?"

"Band fight," Joe says, seemingly unconcerned. He takes a long drag of his beer. "You guys want to smoke?"

"Sure," Brendon says. He sits down on the grass in front of them, and after a moment Ryan and Spencer slowly follow suit. 

"You guys don't look like you're fighting," Ryan says. 

"Not us," Andy says, and jerks his thumb over his shoulder towards Pete's house. Brendon cranes his neck until he can see the back of Patrick's head through Pete's picture windows. Patrick is waving his arms and gesturing at Pete, who is standing with his arms crossed, looking murderous. 

"Do they do this a lot?" Spencer says, accepting the joint that Joe hands him. Brendon can feel his eyebrows fly up, because he's never seen Spencer smoke weed in front of Ryan. Ryan, for that matter, has usually absenting himself by this point, but he's still sitting next to Brendon, looking bored and vaguely nervous at the same time. 

Brendon elbows Ryan, making an inquisitive face when Ryan turns to look. Ryan bites his lip and then he just shrugs, like he's saying, _whatever, no big deal, it's not drinking_. Brendon knows that's a lie, but he keeps his mouth shut. Ryan's his own person--he can do what he wants. Brendon isn't going to stop him if he wants to try it. 

Spencer hands the joint to Ryan and Ryan blinks at it for a moment before copying Spencer's thumb-and-forefinger approach and carefully inhaling. There's a beat of silence and then he's making a face and coughing loudly and forcefully, handing the joint over to Brendon and shaking his head. 

"Ugh," Ryan says. 

Brendon shrugs. "I don't get how you can smoke cigarettes sometimes and not smoke weed," he says, taking his own long hit off the joint. 

"It's different," Ryan says. "That stuff tastes like ass." He's playing it cool but Brendon thinks Ryan might be a little shell-shocked from trying what--to Brendon's knowledge--is his first mind-altering substance ever. Brendon shuffles closer, bumping his shoulder against Ryan's for solidarity. Spencer is already there, close enough on the other side of him to touch, one hand carefully placed behind Ryan's back, near his hip. 

"No good?" Brendon whispers quietly, while Joe and Andy are otherwise occupied. 

"Not my thing," Ryan whispers back. He's shaking with adrenaline ever so slightly. Brendon is close enough to touch, close enough to kiss the curve of tendon and bone that hides behind Ryan's ear. For a stupid, crazy second, he wants to. He wants to hold Ryan and tell him it's okay and then suck up all that adrenaline into himself and let Ryan relax.

Brendon nods instead, drawing back so that he's not quite so close. Ryan smells like Old Spice and summer. They all do, since Spencer's the only one who remembered to bring deodorant. 

Ryan fishes a Red Bull out of Andy and Joe's watery cooler instead of continuing to smoke, and after a few more hits Brendon does the same. He wants to be high but functional, not so high that he's going to spend the rest of the evening lying on Pete's lawn. He wants to go screw around on one of Patrick's guitars, maybe. Music always sounds better when he's high. 

"Movies," Ryan says, nudging Brendon on the shoulder. "Come on. We're going to watch Alien versus Predator." 

"Uhhhh," Brendon says. "I'm going to pass. Not when I'm high, dude. I'll get all paranoid." 

Ryan huffs in annoyance. "Then what do you want to watch?" Ryan says. "Pick something."

"I thought the movie was a you-and-Spencer thing," Brendon says, before he can edit himself. He winces as soon as the words come out, but Andy and Joe are packing up their stuff and Spencer is helping them bring in the cooler. No one is close enough to hear them. 

"There is no me-and-Spencer thing," Ryan says. 

"Yes there is," Brendon says. "Shut up, of course there is." 

"We're not dating."

"I didn't say you were dating."

"You were thinking it," Ryan says. 

"Yeah," Brendon says. "Because you guys keep having sex." He tries to keep the bitterness out of his voice. He's not bitter about it, not exactly. He just wants _in_.

" _We_ had sex," Ryan says. He's worrying a cut on the corner of his mouth. "You and me. That definitely counted as sex."

"I know we had sex," Brendon says. "That was charity."

Ryan gives him a look that says _are you fucking serious?_ in not so many words, and Brendon hastens to explain. He'd rather not have Ryan punch him right now. "On your part," Brendon says quickly. "I didn't mean - I meant you were being nice. By sleeping with me." 

"That's not--" Ryan says, and then he snaps his mouth shut. He looks pissed off for a long moment, and then the expression slides off his face and is replaced with his usual nonchalance.

"Whatever," Ryan says. "Come watch a movie with us." He stands up and brushes the grass off his jeans. The keys on his belt loop jingle with the movement, and Ryan shoves them into his back pocket. "You can choose. Whatever you want to watch." He turns and heads towards the house, and Brendon sits and wonders what the hell just happened. 

\--

Brendon ends up stuck between Anchorman, Napoleon Dynamite, and Harold and Kumar go to White Castle, but Ryan casts the deciding vote for Harold and Kumar and then Napoleon Dynamite, over Spencer's vote for Anchorman and more Anchorman.

"We've seen that like four times," Ryan says. "I haven't seen this one yet."

"How the fuck did you not see this movie?" Brendon says. "Didn't you come with us to see it?"

"I had to work, remember?"

"No," Brendon says. "But I'll take your word for it." He's lazing on one end of Pete's sofa, flexing and relaxing his feet so he can feel that whole-body tingle. He's not particularly stoned, but he's definitely tingly. He doesn't think Spencer is particularly stoned, either. It really wasn't that big of a joint for five people. Maybe that's why Ryan isn't freaking out.

"I'm going to heat up one of those frozen pizzas," Spencer says, after they've pulled out Pete's couch and made it suitable for a three-person viewing. He wipes his hands on his jeans. "Maybe some buffalo wings. I'm starving."

"Buffalo wings," Brendon says, nodding furiously. "Also, do one of the veggie ones."

"Right," Spencer says. He wanders off into the kitchen, and Brendon watches him from his perch on the couch. He can just barely see Spencer out of the corner of his eye. 

"What are you doing?" Ryan says, flopping down next to him. 

"Watching Spencer," Brendon says. Ryan's close enough to touch, and Brendon shifts so that his head is resting on Ryan's shoulder. 

"Are you really okay?" Brendon says quietly, staring at the ceiling now that he can't see Spencer from this angle. He hopes Ryan isn't still mad at him, but Ryan's shifting so Brendon can be more comfortable, so he's probably not really that angry. "That was your first time, wasn't it? Are you freaking?"

"Kinda," Ryan says eventually, after a long pause. 

"You don't have to do it," Brendon says. "Seriously. It's fun, but no one's going to think less of you if you don't."

"I know," Ryan says. "It's not about that. I just--I wanted to try it. I wanted to know what the big deal was. But then I just couldn't stop thinking about my dad, and wondering if I was okay, and I hated that feeling of not being in control. It didn't really do anything but I felt weird for a few minutes and it just--I fucking hated it."

"Oh," Brendon says. He shifts closer. He doesn't know what else to do. Part of his brain can't believe that they're even lying like this, snuggled up together on the couch while Ryan tells him secrets. Sex really does change things. 

"Do you want us to stop?" Brendon says, after they've been silent for a few minutes. He doesn't want to stop smoking weed, but he's suddenly certain that right now, he'd do it for Ryan. He doesn't know when that changed, either. 

"No," Ryan says. He nuzzles Brendon's head a little bit with his chin. "You guys don't have to. Mostly it just makes you both all lazy and dumb. It's kind of funny from the outside. I don't mind when it's you or Spencer or Brent. It's just--I can't do it." 

"Okay," Brendon says. He thinks about kissing Ryan again, but then Spencer's coming back in with the pizza. Brendon fights the urge to sit up and apologize to Spencer about how close he is to Ryan.

"Shove over," Spencer says. He sits down on Brendon's other side, close enough to touch, and Brendon's stomach flip-flops into something warm and happy.

"Pizza," Brendon says, opening his mouth and giving Spencer pleading eyes.

"I'm not feeding it to you," Spencer says, smiling and folding his slice in half for better access. "Get your own." 

"Fine," Brendon says, and sits up and pulls the pizza tray towards him. 

\--

It takes the better part of the second movie before Brendon realizes that something really is different, and that this isn't just Ryan and Spencer being affectionate. Brendon has always operated on the assumption that it's safer to believe that everything is friendly until proven otherwise, except when it's people you don't know and you're looking to get laid. Then all bets are off, but with friends Brendon has always been a little more cautious. Brendon's friends actually _know_ him, which isn't exactly a point in Brendon's favor.

"Quit moving," Spencer rumbles into Brendon's ear. "I'm comfortable. Stop ruining it."

"Sorry," Brendon says. He's still in the middle, with Ryan on one side and Spencer on the other. He's trying to watch the movie, but it's hard to focus. Spencer has one hand on Brendon's hip, placed there lazily like it had suddenly become too heavy to move. Ryan is stretched out on Brendon's other side, his head tucked into the crook of Brendon's shoulder. Brendon's heart is beating double-time in his chest. He doesn't even know how they got here, only that tiny imperceptible movements suddenly turned into skin and touch. A hand on his hip, after a long stretch from Spencer. Ryan's head on his shoulder when Ryan rolled over to make himself more comfortable. Both of them pushing ever so slightly, and giving him every chance to back out. Brendon doesn't want to back out. 

"Are you okay?" Ryan says. "You're breathing funny." 

"Uh," Brendon says. "No, yeah. I'm cool."

"Right."

Brendon wants to sit up, wants to stand up and yell _what the fuck are we doing?_ and make Ryan and Spencer come clean. But at the same time he feels like that might break the spell, like talking about it would make them all realize what a bad idea this is. There is no possible way this is going to work out well, but Brendon is having a hard time caring. All he can think about is Spencer's hand on his hip and the way the pads of his fingers feel warm through Brendon's thin t-shirt. 

Brendon thinks about Spencer's long fingers, and then immediately stops that train of thought in a panic when his body starts to respond. _No_ , Brendon thinks desperately. _No, not here, not now. Not yet_. 

When he looks up to try and pay attention to the movie for the hundredth time, he sees Spencer watching him. Spencer looks at him for a long moment, quiet but intense, not letting Brendon break eye contact. Spencer's eyes aren't really blue. They're more of a gray-blue, a not-quite-there shade. Brendon has never given so much thought to someone else's eye color before but Spencer is right _there_ , inches away, and Brendon can see every ring of color and every subtle shade that bleeds out from his iris. He wonders if his own eyes are as complex and lovely as Spencer's.

Spencer's eyes flick down to where Brendon is semi-hard and trying to hide it, and then he shifts his body so that he's lying on his side, closer to Brendon, skin to skin. Brendon swallows when he feels the unmistakable sensation of Spencer's cock hardening against his thigh.

"Just watch the movie," Spencer says quietly, after he's gotten himself comfortable again. He lets his hand trail across Brendon's stomach, coming to rest on his opposite hip, near Ryan. Brendon can't breathe. He wants to lean into the touch, to take what Spencer is offering. He can't remember a time when he didn't want Spencer. 

"I need to get comfortable," Brendon says, and turns on his side, so his back is facing Spencer and he's facing Ryan, who is watching them both with quiet fascination. Spencer pulls him in and then they're spooning, Spencer's cock pressed up against Brendon's ass, one palm low on Brendon's stomach. Brendon's heart is racing. He's painfully hard in his jeans. 

"You can't see the movie like this," Ryan says. His voice is flat but the way his eyes turn up make Brendon suspect that he's just teasing.

"Yeah, but I'm more comfortable now." 

"Agreed," Spencer says, tucking his nose behind Brendon's ear. 

"Mm."

"If we're not going to watch the movie," Ryan says slowly. "Maybe we should just go to bed." 

"Yeah," Brendon says, after a last, breathless moment of panic. He wants this, he's just--scared. But Spencer's arm is tightening around his stomach in agreement, and Brendon would be a fool to turn this down. Besides, he's horny as fuck and he needs to get off. 

"Yeah, let's do that." 

\--

The first thing that Ryan does when they walk into the bunkhouse is go straight to Brendon's bunk and shove all of his stuff out of the way. His shoes hit the floor with a dull thunk.

"Hey," Brendon says, frowning. 

He watches as Ryan tugs the thin mattress off of the bunkbed and then on to the floor, and then finally gets it when Ryan goes to Spencer's bunk and starts doing the same thing. The space between the bunks is tight, but not that tight and--as Ryan has just proven--is about the length of one mattress. 

When all of the mattresses in the bunkhouse are on the floor and laid out side-by-side, Ryan looks over at them, defiant. He looks like he's expecting them to make fun of him, but all Spencer says is, "I think if we spread out some of these blankets we can cover the whole thing and make a bottom sheet."

Brendon helps Spencer set everything up, piling pillows on the long end and helping him set up a sheet of sorts. In the end, they have a four-mattress bed, definitely big enough for the three of them. 

"So," Brendon says, staring down at the bed. Anticipation is still buzzing through his veins but it's tempered with something that tastes like fear, now that they've broken the moment. "We're just going to--"

"Do you have a better idea?" Ryan says, stripping off his shirt. 

"Not really," Brendon says. His hands hover around his belt buckle, and then he decides to take the safe route and just strip his shirt off, like Ryan's doing. He looks over to see Spencer doing the same and he has a sudden, crazy idea. 

"We should go swimming," Brendon says. Ryan's looking at him like he's insane, but Spencer is nodding, stripping out of his pants with an easy, fluid motion.

"Strip," Brendon says, grinning over his shoulder as he starts heading out towards the pool. He tosses his clothing off with abandon, dropping his underwear by the side of the pool.

"Brendon!" Ryan hisses from the door of the bunkhouse, playing his maidenly virtue card, but Brendon just rolls his eyes and points back to Pete's dark, silent house. There's a light burning on the upstairs level, but it's past midnight and even if Pete's awake he hasn't shown any inclination to come downstairs. 

"Don't act like you haven't done it before," Brendon says, and jumps in. The sensation of the water against his skin is just as shocking as he remembers, and when he comes up for air he realizes that Spencer is only a few feet away. 

"Is Ryan still inside?" Brendon asks, shaking water out of his eyes.

"He's coming," Spencer says, and kisses him. 

Brendon opens his mouth under Spencer's, parting his lips when Spencer's tongue touches lightly at the seam. His hands end up on Spencer's waist seemingly of their own volition. Spencer's arms are around Brendon's lower back, holding him up. His mouth is warmer than the water surrounding them, and Brendon can feel himself growing hard. He wants to pull Spencer in closer and revel in all of that skin, wants to know what Spencer's been hiding. 

There's a splash from the deep end, and then Ryan's head pops up, looking annoyed. 

"Don't make out without me," Ryan says, swimming over to them. 

"Hey, _you_ already got to make out with him," Spencer says. He pulls Brendon in closer and Brendon's stomach feels warm.

"Obviously," Ryan says. He leans up against the lip of the pool, spreading his long arms out for balance. "I meant, don't start without me, because I want to watch." 

"Oh," Spencer says. He tugs Brendon closer to the edge of the pool, slightly closer to the shallows so the water is only up to their waists.

"If you just wanted to watch porn I'm sure Pete's got Skinimax, dude," Brendon says. Ryan kicks him in the shin, and Spencer kisses him again, all in one moment. Brendon makes a weird, strangled noise into Spencer's mouth, holding on to his shoulders to steady himself. Spencer grins under Brendon's mouth.

"Ignore him," Spencer says, and pulls Brendon flush against his body. Brendon shivers at the feeling of so much _skin_ , head to toe and in between. Spencer's half-hard and he's hard for _Brendon_ and Brendon can't get enough of this, of everything. He locks one arm around Spencer's waist, letting himself be kissed. Brendon's under no illusions about who is doing the kissing this time. He and Ryan had managed to find some give-and-take; with Spencer, Brendon knows who's in charge, and it's definitely not him. 

Spencer slides one hand up to Brendon's cheek, the other staying cupped around his hipbone. Brendon keeps his hands tangled in Spencer's hair, even though he wants to touch. 

"We should probably let Ryan in," Brendon says, trying to hide the sudden tinge of regret that blooms in his chest. He's really enjoying the sensation of feeling smaller-than.

"He likes to watch," Spencer says. He kisses Brendon's lower lip and then he turns to look at Ryan, now barely an arm's length away.

"Don't stop on my account," Ryan says, raising an eyebrow. "Please, continue." 

Spencer and Brendon stare at him.

"That wasn't sarcastic," Ryan says, after a pause. "No, seriously, like. Continue."

"Oh," Brendon says. He tilts his chin up and Spencer kisses him again. Brendon lets himself just melt into it, hanging on with his arms around Spencer's neck and his hands in Spencer's hair. 

"You're a lot less bitey with Spencer," Ryan says.

"What?" Brendon says, opening his eyes.

"You're not--" Ryan waves his hands in the air, searching for the words. "You're letting him take control. You didn't let me take control. You made me fight for it."

"Did you _want_ to take control?" Brendon says. He ignores the way his cheeks are pinking at Ryan's words. He feels like he should be fighting back for his honor, or something, but mostly he just wants to stand here and let Spencer do whatever he wants. 

"I don't know," Ryan muses. He flicks the cut at the corner of his mouth with his tongue. "If it makes you get all boneless like that, maybe I do."

"Maybe it's not an open offer," Brendon says. He swallows, his Adam's apple bumping up against Spencer's tongue. Spencer is _definitely_ bitey.

Spencer mumbles something against Brendon's throat, and then he pulls away to repeat himself when Ryan gives him an impatient look. 

"You got pretty boneless, too," Spencer says. 

"You were sucking my dick," Ryan says.

"Oh god," Brendon says. "Seriously, can someone suck my dick, please? Please?"

"You should have just said something before," Ryan says. He tugs on Brendon's arm and kisses Brendon when Brendon turns to face him, Spencer's mouth still mapping a trail over Brendon's collarbones. Brendon bites down on Ryan's lip for good measure. 

"You like it when I bite you," Brendon says, against Ryan's mouth, and Ryan hmmms in encouragement. 

"Sit over here, on the lip," Ryan says, and Brendon nods, hoisting himself up. He shivers once and then Ryan's mouth is swallowing him down and Brendon can't do anything but moan. He tilts his head back and looks up at the stars. It's all streetlights and neon, a faint fluorescent glow, no stars here to be seen or wished upon. Brendon wonders how this came to be his life. 

He lets his hands fall to Ryan's head, patting clumsily and gently when something feels particularly mind-blowing. Spencer's watching Ryan from behind, his cheeks flushed red and his eyes dark. Brendon motions him over, biting his lip when Spencer gets close. He wants to retain his composure but--Ryan is sucking his dick. He knows everything he's feeling is broadcast on his face, loud and in technicolor.

Spencer's eyes flick down to Ryan's head, and then back up against to meet Brendon's eyes. 

"This isn't your first time getting a...?" Spencer says, framing it as not quite a question. He arches an eyebrow.

"Define 'first time,'" Brendon says. Spencer kisses him instead, one hand covering Brendon's on the back of Ryan's head. 

"So hot," Spencer says softly, and Brendon doesn't know if he's referring to Ryan's mouth stretched around his cock or the way Brendon can't seem to hold his reactions in check; either way the result is the same. His balls tighten up and he squeezes Ryan's shoulder in a frantic warning, biting down on Spencer's lip and moaning as he starts to come. 

"Wow," Brendon says, once his brain has cleared.

"Yeah," Ryan says. 

A light flickers on in the upstairs of Pete's house and Spencer says, "Uh, we should probably go." 

"Yeah," Brendon and Ryan say quickly, in unison. Brendon hoists himself up to standing, and then reaches down to help drag Ryan up by the biceps when he's not moving fast enough. It's not that Brendon's worried about Pete seeing them naked; it's that he has no idea who else is in Pete's house, and he doesn't need to show his pasty ass to half of Hollywood. 

"Come on, fuck, hurry up," Spencer says, as another light goes on. Their feet slap wetly against the pavement and then they've diving behind the side of the pool storage box, and from there it's a quick walk through dimly lit paths back to the bunkhouse. Brendon's dick drags against his thigh and he thinks about how much weirder this would be if he was running around still hard. 

Spencer pulls open the door and they all duck inside, shivering in the sudden shock of the air conditioning. 

"Towels," Ryan says, and they all reach for the thin pile next to the doorway. It's not enough but it's something, and Brendon's hair, at least, feels dry by the time he's flopping down onto their makeshift bed with Ryan and Spencer.

"Get over here," Spencer says, tugging Brendon in and crawling under the blanket. "I'm freezing, you're always warm."

"No, me," Ryan says, snuggling in on Brendon's other side.

"Both of your feet are fucking freezing," Brendon says, but after that he's not complaining about being in the middle again. He's surrounded by nakedness, by the smell of skin and the gentle scratch of hair. Brendon thinks he could probably fall asleep like this and die happy. He closes his eyes.

"Don't fall asleep," Ryan says, poking him in the belly. "Don't fall asleep, no one's gotten me off yet." Brendon grumbles under his breath, pouting and slapping ineffectually in Ryan's general direction. 

"Yeah, we should do that," Spencer says, and drags Brendon's hand slowly over to his upper thigh, rolling over to kiss him. Brendon blinks and thinks, _oh, okay. Hell yes._

"The whole point of this was that we'd never have to get ourselves off ever again," Ryan says, knee-walking over both Brendon and Spencer to Spencer's other side. 

"I thought the point of this was that you wanted both me and Brendon and didn't want to have to choose," Spencer says. Brendon stills under Spencer's mouth, because it's the first time either of them has given an actual reason for this, and he doesn't want to miss it. 

"Well, yeah. And I wanted both of you to get me off."

"How charming," Brendon says. "I'm touched."

"It _is_ charming," Ryan says, settling in with a happy sigh as Spencer's hand starts traveling down his stomach. He stretches his arms above his head and yawns. "You're apparently the only two people I want to get off with right now. That's practically marriage in some states."

"We _are_ in California," Spencer says, and Brendon laughs against Spencer's mouth. Spencer grins in response and kisses Brendon one last time, soft and sweet, before turning over to kiss Ryan. Brendon takes a deep breath and wraps his hand around Spencer's cock, rubbing his thumb over the head and reaching down with his other hand to cup Spencer's balls. He can't believe he's touching Spencer's cock, his _actual_ cock, not the one that Brendon's been imagining in his head for however long. 

It's nice; it's medium-sized and thick and it suits Spencer perfectly. Brendon likes the heavy weight of it in his hand. He pulls back to spit on his palm and Spencer squeezes his thigh. 

"I like it dry," Spencer mumbles, against Ryan's mouth. 

"Huh." Brendon shrugs, wrapping his fingers around Spencer's cock again. It seems bizarre to him, but okay. Different strokes, and all that. 

"Spencer's weird," Ryan says. Spencer pulls his hand back from Brendon's thigh so he can pinch Ryan's nipple.

"Ow, you fucker, that's--ow." Ryan reaches over and returns the favor, but instead of shifting away Spencer bucks up into Brendon's hand.

"You _like_ that?"

"No. Shut up and enjoy the handjob," Spencer says. He speeds up his hand on Ryan's cock--wet, like he already knows how Ryan likes it, which Brendon supposes he does. 

Brendon jerks Spencer slowly for a few moments, and then he reaches over and pinches Spencer's other nipple. 

"God _dammit_ ," Spencer says, but the word goes a little breathy at the end, and Brendon knows he's found a weakness. He smiles to himself and goes back to jerking Spencer off, making sure to pay lots of attention to the head and to Spencer's balls. He waits until Spencer's distracted, and then he curls his fingers and rakes them over Spencer's nipple, just hard enough to sting. Spencer moans in surprise, pulling himself away from Ryan's mouth to roll back to Brendon. 

He kisses Brendon hard, teeth sharp enough to sting in return, and Brendon lets himself melt into it. Spencer's hand tightens over Brendon's hand on his cock, urging him faster, and then Brendon feels Spencer's thigh jerk up. He stills for a moment, mouth open, and then he's coming hot and thick over their combined fists. 

Brendon kisses him messily. He's vaguely aware of Ryan pressed up against Spencer's back, leaning his head into the dip of Spencer's shoulder blades and finishing himself off. Brendon wants to lend a hand, but he can't seem to stop kissing Spencer. 

"Fuck," Ryan says, and jerks up against Spencer's side, mouth pressed messily against his shoulder. Brendon knows just from looking at him that he's coming, even if he can't see the actual evidence. Spencer shudders beneath Brendon's mouth at the same moment, and Brendon thinks back to how awesome it had felt when Ryan came all over his stomach. 

"I thought the whole point of this was that I never had to do that again," Ryan mumbles, after a few moments have passed. 

Spencer rolls his eyes, hard enough that Brendon can see it even though they're so close that his eyes are crossing. Spencer pulls away from Brendon to face Ryan, biting him on the nose. 

"Suck it up," Spencer says. 

"Make me," Ryan says. 

Brendon has the sense that he's seeing some long-established friend ritual, so he keeps silent. He's proven correct in the next few seconds, as Ryan eventually gives in and then leans in to kiss Spencer, long and slow. 

"We need toilet paper or something," Brendon says, looking down at his rapidly-cooling hand. 

"I nominate you," Ryan says. 

"Yeah, yeah." Brendon gets up carefully, trying not to wipe come everywhere. He rinses his hand off in the sink and then he grabs a roll of spare toilet paper and tosses it back into the other room, hitting Spencer in the head. 

"Dude," Spencer says, injured. 

Brendon shrugs as he walks back into the room and flops down. He can't explain the sudden urge any more than he can usually explain why he does things, so he doesn't bother trying. 

"Someone should turn the lights off," Brendon says. "Not it." 

Ryan gets up and shuffles over to the light switch. Brendon wonders how far this is going to go. Are they cuddling? Is this a cuddling thing? He doesn't know if he wants it to be a cuddling thing. He's not very good at lines, at understanding the unspoken rules that everyone else seems to perceive so effortlessly. He doesn't know if he can cuddle now and pretend they're all just friends in the morning. 

He waits to see if he's going to get an answer, but all Spencer does is stretch out on his back, his shoulder touching Brendon's. 

The lights go off. Brendon closes his eyes. 

\--

Brendon's most useful strategy when he's bored out of his fucking mind is to start making mental charts of his day, listing facts and figures in imaginary columns. It's not something he does to try and organize his thoughts. Brendon has given up on trying to organize anything at all in his brain. It's more that counting and tallying up the times he says "Dude" and the number of people wearing black t-shirts and cups of coffee he sees in trash cans gives him something to _do_. Reality doesn't happen fast enough for Brendon Urie, and when it seems to be dragging by especially slowly he has to get creative. 

Brendon's spent all of his morning and most of his afternoon putting his well-honed skills to the test, mentally counting every moment of weirdness between him and Spencer and Ryan. He's also keeping track of kids with brightly dyed hair that stop at their table (Six blue, four green, one red, one purple, one pink, too much bleach to count), the number of feedback screeches from the main stage, how many people he's told about their band, the number of kids wearing FBR merch, and the total number of times he's complained about how fucking hot it is this week. 

"We're in _California_ ," Brendon says, when Ryan rolls his eyes in response to Brendon's latest tirade. "It's not _supposed_ to be this hot. I mean, whatever, if we were in Vegas it would be fine, but we're not. It's ninety degrees in December. We're all going to die of global warming."

"It's a heat wave," Spencer says, texting someone on his phone with his feet kicked up on their merch table. Brent, probably. Spencer's the closest with Brent out of any of them, despite the fact that Brendon and Brent share two classes and gym twice a week. "It's going to break tomorrow and then it's going to be in the sixties the rest of the week." 

"And then Brendon will shut up about the weather and I will die happy," Ryan says. Brendon leans over and flicks him in the temple. 

"If I shut up you'll never be famous," Brendon says. 

"If I kill you we'll never be famous either."

"You wouldn't kill me," Brendon says, biting his lip and looking over at Ryan over the crook of his arm. 

"Maybe," Ryan says, after a beat. He looks at Brendon out of the corner of his eye, his mouth curving to the side in a small smile. His left Converse nudges Brendon's ankle for a moment. 

_Flirting, 23. Awkward, 29_ , Brendon thinks to himself. Spencer has touched him thirty-nine times today, and Ryan thirty-one. Seventy-two smiles, six wrists against hips. Brendon hasn't been keeping track of his own smiles, but he thinks they're probably similar. He's been touching both Ryan and Spencer just as much as he normally does, but now they both lean into it, stay with the contact longer.

He doesn't have any clue what it means. 

\--

"Just meet us later on at the restaurant," Pete says, tinny through the speakers of Brendon's cell phone. "I'll give you the address, you can look it up." 

"I think we have a map somewhere," Brendon says. Ryan's ass is sticking out the side of the vehicle as he searches around underneath the seats. He looks over at Spencer, who shrugs. 

"Just stop anywhere in the Valley and get one," Pete says. "This is LA, they have them everywhere."

"Right, okay," Brendon says. Ryan gives a yelp of victory from underneath Brendon's front seat, and then waves a crumpled map in their direction.

"Never mind, we found it," Brendon says. "Go ahead," He listens as Pete gives them the address, and then he repeats it to Spencer, who writes it down on the back of a gas station receipt. 

"We'll be there," Brendon promises, and hangs up. 

"This is kind of far away," Spencer says, squinting at the map. "We're going to end up sitting in traffic for like two hours if we leave now." 

"He's not even there yet, dude."

"Right, but like, we have to plan for traffic. So if he wants us there at 8, we need to leave in like an hour." 

"Okay," Brendon says. "So we have an hourto kill, then." He looks up at Pete's house from the driveway. It's silent and empty, but Pete has one of those fake dog poop things with a set of keys in it hidden in the garden. They all know the alarm code. They can still get in. 

"I've always wanted to have sex in the shower," Ryan says, apropos of nothing.

"Me...too?" Brendon says. 

"I'm starting to think you have some kind of weird underwater sex obsession," Spencer says. "Pools, hot tubs, and now this."

"I'm taking advantage of all California has to offer," Ryan says breezily. "And Pete's downstairs shower is really big. Come on, I bet we can all fit in there."

"I'm really gross," Brendon says. He sniffs himself, and makes a face. As much as getting laid sounds awesome, he doesn't feel particularly sexy right now. Mostly he feels grimy and sweaty. 

"Did you not get the part where this involves one of us getting you off," Ryan says. 

Brendon thinks about this for a moment. 

"Lead the way," he says, giving a mental shrug to the universe. He's not going to turn that down, even if he doesn't understand why anyone would want to have sex with him right now. Maybe he can sneak into the shower first and rinse off beforehand. 

"That's my boy," Spencer says, clapping him on the shoulder.

\--

The restaurant that Pete takes them to doesn't have prices on the menu, which Brendon knows is code for _really fucking expensive_. He's only been in a place like this once before. He feels insanely underdressed until he sees Pete, who is wearing almost the exact same thing that they are and isn't really giving a fuck.

"Hey! Heeeey," Pete says, smiling wide and happy. The intentional solitude of his past few days seems to be gone, replaced by a crowd of people who all look vaguely familiar. Brendon starts to connect names to faces just as Pete starts introducing them to everyone.

"Guys, this is Gabe Saporta," Pete says, gesturing to a tall, handsome guy to his left. "He's working on a new project that he's going to release with the label. Uh, who else, you probably know Matt, he's cool," Pete says, gesturing to someone who Brendon belatedly recognizes as Matt Rubano from Taking Back Sunday. He vaguely recognizes Gabe, too, although he can't remember where he's from.

Pete continues introducing them, although Brendon soon loses track of names and faces. Not everyone is some famous musician that makes Brendon want to melt into the floor, but everyone seems connected to the music business. Brendon likes that Pete doesn't play favorites, or care about which of his friends are famous, but just once he'd like some warning that he's about to have dinner with one of his idols.

"Hey, hi, yeah, hey," Brendon says, squeezing into the booth with Spencer and Ryan. Spencer is seated next to Gabe, while Ryan is on Brendon's right, near the outside. Pete beams at them.

"Whatever you want, you've been working hard," Pete says, pushing menus towards them. "I took a look at your sales for the last two days. They're solid."

"Thanks," Spencer says. "We've been trying to talk up the band."

"Good," Pete says. "Keep talking. Talk to everyone you know. Talk to everyone you _don't_ know."

"Brendon's on it," Ryan says. Brendon kicks him under the table, and then elbows him for good measure. Ryan's been kind of weird all day, sullen and vaguely cranky, although Brendon doesn't think it has anything to do with him and Spencer. Ryan's been nicer to Brendon than he usually is, and he's definitely flirting with Brendon when he manages to break out of his own head.

Brendon lets the conversation continue on without him, and flips open the menu. It seems to be some sort of Asian-Tex-Mex fusion, with spicy fish tacos and cucumber salads and peanut chicken egg rolls. Brendon scans the menu and picks the appetizer platter, and then looks up to see the waiter waiting patiently for his order.

Spencer orders tacos. Ryan orders the peanut egg rolls. Brendon orders the appetizer platter and then immediately regrets it when the waiter informs him that it's usually for two people.

"Uh," Brendon says. He can feel his cheeks heating.

"We'll eat some of it," Pete says, waving the waiter away. "It's fine."

"Sorry," Brendon says, trying to laugh it off. "I didn't see that part."

"Don't apologize," Pete says. "It's not like we're hurting for people to help you eat it." He gestures around the table, where everyone else is digging into _their_ appetizers. "Gabe always eats enough for two people anyway."

"So do I," Brendon says.

"Don't forget Ryan," Spencer chimes in. Brendon snorts. Ryan eats enough for three people on any given day, and he's still as skinny as a telephone pole. Brendon's thin, but not like Ryan is. Ryan tends to hover on just this side of fashionably gaunt, whereas when Brendon loses weight it just makes him look younger.

"Pete's been telling me about the stuff you guys are working on," Matt says, biting into a spring roll and leaning towards the three of them. "It sounds pretty awesome. I like the concept."

"We really want to play up the vaudeville theme," Spencer replies, falling into his usual role of Band Promoter and Responsible Young Adult. "We want to try and reinvent the idea of cabaret in a modern sense. Like, yeah, it was dark originally, but this is a new kind of dark. It's about the darkness behind all the fake shit you hear and see and read."

"It's ironic," Ryan says. "On multiple levels."

"Irony is always good."

"So are backbeats," Gabe says. He's got one arm thrown over the back of the leather booth, and he seems to be lazily attempting to hit on Spencer. Brendon steals a fried zucchini thing from Pete's plate and watches as Gabe leans in a little closer.

"Yeah, Pete said the stuff you were working on right now is kind of similar in terms of percussion," Spencer says. Brendon turns away then, even though he does actually have a lot of feelings about the percussion on their new album and he's also curious about what Gabe is working on. Ryan is quiet and tense next to him.

"What's up?" Brendon says quietly, letting the conversation carry over his voice.

"Nothing," Ryan says.

"You've been weird all day," Brendon says, stealing another zucchini thing when no one's looking. Tempura, maybe. Or pakora. One of those.

"It's fine," Ryan says.

"Then why aren't you talking?" Brendon says.

"It's not--it's not a big deal," Ryan says. "Ask me later. Not now."

"Fine," Brendon says, and turns back to Gabe to give his highly unnecessary two cents on the use of five-eighths time in modern pop music.

\--

Spencer climbs in the back of the van with Ryan after dinner, although they're sitting in the front bench seat so Brendon doesn't feel particularly excluded. Brendon pulls out of the parking lot behind Pete's SUV and tries to listen to Ryan and Spencer's conversation.

"You _love_ Taking Back Sunday," Spencer says, letting his head fall back against the top of the seat. He kicks his feet up on Brendon's center console, and pokes Brendon in the side with his toes. "Why didn't you talk to Matt? He's pretty nice."

"I didn't know what to say," Ryan says. "What, am I supposed to flail all over him?"

"No, you're supposed to act like a fellow musician who wants to talk about music with him," Spencer says. "You managed to fake it with Pete, why is Matt so different?"

"I'm not faking it with Pete," Ryan says, frowning at Spencer. "We're friends."

"Not now, you're not," Spencer agrees. "But before. Don't tell me you weren't at least a little star-struck."

"Of course I was, shut up," Ryan says. "It's not that."

"Then what is it?"

"I hate it when he does that," Ryan says, looking out the window. "It's like we're his cute little pets. It's condescending."

"I don't think he means it like that."

"It's Pete," Brendon interjects. "Come on, he totally means it like that. But I don't think he's _trying_ to be insulting."

"Either way, I hate it," Ryan says. "I'm not going to jump and bark on command."

"None of us are," Brendon says, suddenly very certain that that's true. Spencer likes to make nice, but when it comes down to it none of them are interested in playing the Hollywood game. Brendon just wants a recording studio and some instruments and a chance to make their album, that's all. When it all comes down to it, it's about the music.

"He wasn't trying to make us jump tonight," Spencer says. "He was just introducing us. He was being nice."

"Maybe," Ryan says. His frown has relaxed into a vaguely displeased expression.

"Talk to Pete about it," Brendon says, suddenly tired of the conversation. "If it pisses you off that much, tell him."

"He won't get it," Ryan says.

"He'll probably get it," Spencer says. "But if you think he won't, tell Patrick. He'll lean on Pete to make sure he doesn't act like an asshole."

"Yeah," Ryan says, deflating. "Yeah, you're right."

"I'm always right," Spencer says, as they pull into the driveway. "It's my secret superpower."

"Mine is eating an entire two-person appetizer platter," Brendon says.

"Mine is texting and driving," Ryan says. "But in the absence of my car, I'll take 'gives amazing head.'"

"Agreed," Brendon and Spencer say in unison, as they get out of the van.

\--

Brendon feels the weirdness seep in again once they're back in the bunkhouse a few hours later, after hanging out with Pete and his friends for a while and having an epic battle of Wii bowling. He'd been paired with Gabe and they'd actually turned out to be a good team; they'd stayed on top through three rounds of knock-out matches before being bested by Matt and his studio producer.

Brendon pulls his shirt off and winces at the smell before throwing it in a corner. Pete had promised them laundry tomorrow, as well as some free merch and clean boxers to wear while they were washing everything. Brendon shucks his gross jeans but decides to leave his underwear on, even though it's soaked through with sweat. It's not that he doesn't love being naked, but it seems like being naked around Ryan and Spencer is suddenly rife with hidden meanings.

Spencer tugs his shirt off, and then he flops down on their bed, staring up at the ceiling. Brendon wonders if Pete's been in here and seen their bed. He can't think of any reason why that would happen, but at the same time, if they're trying to keep this quiet maybe they shouldn't have made a giant love nest in the center of their lodgings.

"So I've never had anyone finger me," Spencer says conversationally, like he's talking about the weather.

"You and most of the world," Brendon says. His heart is suddenly beating double-time in his chest. He hasn't even--it would be a lie to say he's never thought about it, because he has, somewhere deep down inside where he could keep it hidden. He's watched straight porn where that happened, and found it blisteringly hot. But he's never told anyone that, and he's _definitely_ never considered the fact that something like that could actually happen to him.

"I have," Ryan says. Spencer sits up on the bed and gives Ryan an intensely skeptical look from across the room.

"Bullshit," Spencer says. "No way."

"Tarah," Ryan says, tugging his own shirt off. "She just went for it. I didn't tell her no."

"When she was blowing you?" Spencer says.

Ryan nods.

"And?" Spencer says.

"And what?" Ryan says. "It was good. She let me come on her face, too."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"When was that going to come up in conversation? Oh, hey Spencer, I got fingered today, how was your afternoon?"

"This isn't actually real life, is it," Brendon says, to no one in particular, while Ryan and Spencer continue to bicker aimlessly. "This is like, one of those TV shows where they draw you in and then the hidden cameras come out and everyone points and laughs."

"It's not that big a deal," Ryan says, turning to face him. "You've never had a girl do that to you?"

"No," Brendon says. "Obviously I haven't been dating the right girls." He can't even imagine. Granted, he's never had a steady girlfriend, but still.

"Well, I haven't either," Spencer says. "So you should show me so I can decide for myself."

"I will if you go take a shower," Ryan says. "And wash. Really well."

"Okay," Spencer says, getting up from his bunk and shucking his pants and boxers in one easy motion. "Deal."

"What about me?" Brendon says.

"What about you?" Ryan says. "Go take a shower, Brendon."

"But I--"

"Unless you don't want to do it," Ryan says. His tone is even, with no hint of mockery. He's just stating a fact, like if Brendon doesn't want to do it, it's fine, and if he does, he needs to shower.

"I'll--" Brendon pauses, trying to think. "I'll just. Go join Spencer. I guess."

"Good choice," Ryan says, the corner of his mouth curving up into a smile. 

Brendon nods and walks over to their small bathroom. He strips off his boxer briefs and leaves them on the floor and then joins Spencer in the shower, because apparently this is something that they do now.

\--

Watching Ryan and Spencer fuck is pretty much exactly like porn, which is why Brendon feels no shame in jerking off while he watches. It's better than porn, actually, because Spencer keeps leaning over to kiss Brendon while Ryan goes down on him.

"Is he doing it yet?" Brendon whispers, after biting down on Spencer's bottom lip hard enough to bruise. 

Spencer licks the sore spot and says, "Not yet. Trust me, I think you'll know." His eyes are soft and unfocused when he looks at Brendon, like there's too many endorphins running through his body for him to bother with silly things like sight.

Brendon tucks his hand behind Spencer's ear, around the cradle of his head, and kisses him again. From this angle he can see Ryan's mouth, and Ryan's hands, but he can't see anything else.

Ryan pulls off, his mouth red and wet. "Brendon," Ryan says, wiping his face with the back of his hand. "Come down here."

"Mmmph," Brendon says. He breaks away from Spencer and then leans in to press one last kiss to his mouth before shimmying down the bed to join Ryan. Spencer rolls his shoulders back and wraps a hand around his cock, too far gone to stop touching himself.

"Hey," Ryan says, his eyelashes brushing Brendon's cheek in an accidental butterfly kiss. "You should learn how to do this."

"So I can do it to you guys?" Brendon says. The thought makes his whole body feel hot and tight.

"Well, yeah," Ryan says, in a _duh_ sort of voice. "But also maybe it won't be so weird for you if you know what I'm doing."

"It's not weird for me," Brendon says, suddenly on the defensive.

"Okay," Ryan says, in a tone that implies he doesn't believe Brendon one bit. "Well, anyway. You need to get your fingers really wet." Ryan leans up on one elbow, pushing two of his fingers past Spencer's lips. Spencer goes for them eagerly, sucking on them in a way that makes Ryan groan softly.

"I thought you needed lube, " Brendon says. He knows almost nothing about this, but all the porn he's seen has definitely included lots of lube.

Ryan shrugs. "I guess," Ryan says. "Tarah just used lots of spit."

"But if your fingers have already been..."

"You spit. On your hand. Like before. " Ryan pulls his fingers gently out of Spencer's mouth, and then spits on his palm. Brendon's stomach does a weird roll, like he's flying down a hill on his skateboard.

"Oh," Brendon says.

"Yeah," Ryan says. He rubs two fingers together, and then he spits on them once more. "Spencer, can you--open your legs more."

Spencer whimpers, letting his legs fall open. His thigh muscles are tight with tension, and Brendon pushes Spencer's hand off his cock. "Don't come yet," Brendon says, resting his chin on Spencer's thigh. Ryan gives him an approving nod. Spencer moans and shifts restlessly.

"So, uh, you just kind of--" Ryan says, holding Spencer open. Brendon leans over to look and it's weird, it's definitely weird, because he's never thought about seeing that part of Spencer before. Part of his brain is stuck in toddler gross-out mode, and then Ryan rubs at Spencer's rim and slides the tip of one finger slowly inside him.

"Jesus," Spencer says, his mouth falling open.

"It feels a lot bigger than it is," Ryan says conspiratorially.

"I can see that," Brendon says.

"More," Spencer says. Ryan nods and slides the rest of the tip in, stopping at the first joint of his finger. He lets Spencer get used to the sensation and then he pushes his finger in and out, so slowly at first that it makes Brendon's dick ache. God, he wants someone to do that to him. He's always had this weird fantasy about having sex with someone really slowly, like doing it for hours and hours or something. Watching Ryan's hand move is sparking some of that, hitting a spot in his brain that makes everything shivery inside.

"Faster?" Ryan says

"Yeah," Spencer says. He stretches out, letting his hands fall above his head, a picture of perfect surrender. Brendon bites his lip. He's never seen Spencer so relaxed. It's hot in a different way. Spencer's face is flushed, his lips red and bitten. His cock is jutting out from his body, hard and straining, and Ryan's fingers are inside him. The whole picture makes Brendon ache. He shifts his hips against the bed, sliding his dick against the wet spot he's created.

"Ah," Spencer says suddenly, grimacing and making a face. Ryan pulls his fingers out, spitting on them liberally.

"Sorry," Ryan says, pushing one finger back in. Spencer's body opens easily around him this time around.

"We should go buy lube," Brendon says.

"Not until I'm done coming," Spencer says. He wraps a hand around his cock and Brendon bats it away again.

"Wait," Brendon says, because he wants to explore this side of Spencer more. He reaches up and pinches Spencer's nipple, feeling gratified when Spencer arches up.

Brendon shifts so he's straddling Spencer, Spencer's dick against his ass. The sensation makes him feel weird and breathless and almost a little scared inside, but he ignores it in favor of scratching his nails down Spencer's chest.

"Fuck, yes. Do it again."

"Pushy," Brendon says lightly.

"I am," Spencer says. He rolls his head to the side, shifting his hips like he can't get enough of Ryan's fingers in his ass. "Now do it again, come on."

Brendon leans down and bites him instead, sinking his teeth in just above Spencer's nipple so he can pinch and bite at the same time. It's kind of fun, honestly. He likes it when Spencer jerks and squirms, and he likes the way Spencer seems to so obviously love it. He thinks back to four days ago, when Spencer cut his own wrist the deepest. Brendon suspects that if someonepinched him during sex, he'd love it too. Sometimes he used to bite his upper arm when he was jerking off, until he had to stop because he was leaving a bruise that couldn't be covered by t-shirts. 

Spencer's whole body jerks up when Ryan goes for two fingers, straining down against Ryan's hand to fit them inside. Brendon gets up and sits down on Spencer's side, spitting on his hand and then rubbing the spit all over Spencer's cock. Spencer bucks up with a yell.

"You can come now," Brendon says, and starts jerking him off. Ryan kisses Spencer's inner thigh and fucks Spencer harder.

"Jesus Christ," Spencer moans. He's pushing his hips down against Ryan's hand and trying to buck up into Brendon's fist at the same time, and it only takes minute or two of their combined onslaught before he's shaking and gasping for breath as he comes into Brendon's hand.

Ryan withdraws his fingers carefully, looking down at them for a moment and then kissing Spencer's thigh and rolling off the bed to go to the bathroom and wash them.

"Christ," Spencer says softly. His chest is heaving, and Brendon crawls up the bed to kiss him, already jerking himself fast and wet and rough. He just wants to come everywhere.

"Come on my face," Spencer says.

"What?" Brendon says, his hand slowing down. There's no way he heard that correctly.

"I have to shower again anyway," Spencer says. "Come on my face, I want to try it."

Brendon crawls on top of Spencer, not bothering to answer. Spencer looks up at him and then he makes a horrible monster face, pulling down his eyelids to show the pink inside the lower rims.

"Oh, fuck you," Brendon says.

"What, you don't want to come on my face like that?"

"You make it sound like such a crime," Brendon says dryly. Spencer grins and then he licks his lips, letting his mouth fall open. Brendon shifts closer, so that the tip of his dick touches Spencer's lower lip on every stroke. Spencer's mouth is warm. Brendon can see Ryan watching them out of the corner of his eye, standing next to the bed and wiping his wet hands off on his stomach.

"Come on," Spencer whispers, giving him a challenging look, like he's daring Brendon to do it. He sticks his tongue out, brushing the tip, and then Brendon is instantly gone. He whimpers and comes all over Spencer's face, attempting not to hit his eyes but in reality having almost no control over where it's going.

"Oh my god," Brendon says. He lets himself fall forward, trying to catch his breath.

"Fuck, my turn," Ryan says breathlessly, pushing Brendon out of the way.

\--

Brendon wakes up the next morning with Spencer's arm thrown over his chest, and Ryan's elbow poking into his shoulder. The sun is peeking through the curtains in a high, bright sort of way, a warm winter glow that tells Brendon it's pretty fucking early.

He blinks up at the ceiling and wonders why he's awake, and then he hears a loud whisper outside the door of the bunkhouse.

"Pete, don't you dare--you have to _knock_."

"It's my bunkhouse."

"Don't be a dick. Just knock on the door. It's polite."

"Nothing exciting ever happens when you knock," Pete says sadly, and then Brendon hears three quick raps on the front door. He can't breathe. His stomach is clenching up in knots and all he can think is _they can't see us, they can't see us like this_.

"Ryan, Spencer," Brendon hisses loudly, elbowing them into wakefulness and throwing a blanket over their naked asses while he jolts out of bed to grab his boxers. "Stop touching, wake up, Pete's outside and he's going to _know_ if he sees you like this."

Ryan blinks up at him, and then he shrugs, sitting up and fumbling around on their bed for his underwear. Spencer seems similarly unconcerned, but Brendon's heart is pounding and he feels a tightness behind his eyes, a ball of terrified fear that's taken up residence in his entire body.

"Good morning!" Pete crows, throwing open the door. Patrick is standing behind him, his hat pulled down low. He's clutching a large coffee and looks like he just woke up.

"Hey," Brendon says weakly. He doesn't mind being naked but right now he feels so exposed that he's grabbing his jeans without a second thought and sliding them on. Ryan and Spencer are thankfully dressed right now, but it's still completely obvious that they're all sleeping in the same bed. Brendon doesn't know what to do. He wants to run.

"Aw, dude, blanket forts are the _best_ ," Pete says, looking at their bed approvingly. Brendon freezes for a moment in shock, and then suddenly everything in his body starts to relax, millimeter by millimeter. "Blanket fort" sounds a lot less sexual than "love nest." Maybe Pete still doesn't know what's going on.

"Yeah," Brendon says. "Uh, the top fell down while we were asleep."

"I hate it when that happens," Pete says. "Anyway! Anyway. I'm free today, you guys are all off until tonight, Patrick's here, and it's time for laser tag."

"Sweet," Spencer says, visibly perking up.

"And mini-golf," Patrick mumbles behind them. He yawns into his hand. "And arcade games and shit. It's a whole big complex."

"I am so in," Brendon says. "So very in."

"Yeah," Ryan says. "Yeah. Good. Me too."

"You're seriously not awake, are you."

"Shut up, Urie."

"Get dressed," Pete says. "Laser tag! Let's go."

\--

Spencer and Pete kick everyone's asses at laser tag, even though Brendon's team has one extra person. Brendon isn't surprised in the least, because Spencer is a secret ninja when it comes to weird things like laser tag and skee-ball and air hockey. Ryan is a secret ninja at things like charming people and texting and driving. Laser tag is not his forte.

Patrick isn't bad, although he has a tendency to underestimate distances and his shots keep falling short of his targets. Brendon kind of sucks too, but his adrenaline rush is keeping him going. He feels like a live wire ready to snap, even after Pete's reaction this morning. He can't stop going over it in his head. He can't decide if Pete's being willfully blind, blissfully unaware, or just shrewd enough not to say it out loud.

Brendon waits for the patter of feet and then pops up behind his fake-rock, keeping himself low and to the side so he's not such an easy target. He sees Pete swing his rifle up and then Brendon pops him in the chest, right on the X, lighting his suit up like a firecracker.

"Nice!" Patrick hisses, pulling him back down behind their cove and giving him a high-five. Brendon nods, trying to grin and look like he means it. He doesn't know what Patrick thinks, either. And it's stupid, he shouldn't care, he knows that of all people Pete and Patrick are probably the most supportive and awesome people he could come out to.

It's just that he figured this out four days ago, said it for the first time out loud the next day, and just--he isn't ready for people to know. The thought of it makes him feel small and scared inside. This week with Spencer and Ryan has been like a fantasy, something divorced from the real world, a boy's playground with all the trappings of men. When Pete walked in this morning, that all ground to a screeching halt. He doesn't even know if Ryan and Spencer are in this for keeps.

"You okay?" Patrick says, giving him a worried look. Brendon shakes his head and realizes he's been staring off into space.

"I'm great," Brendon says, giving Patrick an encouraging smile. _Don't let them see you break. Never let anyone see you break_. "I'm awesome, I'm just tired, you know? I need more coffee."

"Me too," Patrick says, popping up for a moment to try and find Ryan. He's peering out from behind a nearby rock, looking spindly and lost. Patrick waves him over, trying to get him to run behind their cover. Spencer's still out there, stalking them from afar. He is the sneakiest bastard that Brendon has ever met. Brendon tucks his head down, and leans over near Patrick and Ryan to begin talking strategy.

\--

"Only one round of mini-golf," Pete says. "We need to get you guys to the band showcase tonight, it starts at 6."

"It's noon," Ryan says, looking down at his phone.

"Yeah, and we need to go introduce you guys to everyone and set up the booth," Pete says. "No more of this tent stuff. We have actual retail sets for this one. I hope one of you knows how to use a hammer."

"I do," Brendon and Spencer say at the same time.

Ryan looks over at them and shrugs. "I'll hold the nails," Ryan says. "Me and hammers don't mix."

"Last time he used one he broke his toe," Spencer supplies helpfully. Ryan scowls at him.

"At least you know what your weaknesses are," Patrick replies. He's trying to decide between the purple or the green golf club. Brendon has already grabbed the bright pink one, because he's determined to take back pink for the unwashed male masses. When he's famous he's totally going to buy bright pink everything. It's going to rock.

Pete has chosen blue, Spencer is red, and Ryan is yellow. Patrick finally decides on purple, grabbing his matching ball from the dispenser.

"So we play free-for-all," Pete says casually, as he's lining up the first shot. "Everything's legal as long as you don't get arrested."

"Team play?" Brendon says hopefully.

"No," Patrick says. "Just you. But you can do whatever the hell you want to try and get that ball in the hole, as long as you start out putting where you're supposed to."

"Sweet," Spencer says, looking like he's already beginning to strategize.

"So, for example, I can do this," Pete says, putting his ball down the center and then dashing down towards the end. He scoops it up with his toe, dribbling it twice before dropping it in the hole.

"Soccer player," Brendon says approvingly. "Nice."

"High school," Pete says, and Brendon is momentarily struck by an image of Pete at sixteen, his arms clean of tattoos and his hair unstraightened. It's an interesting image. Brendon wouldn't have picked Pete for a jock.

"Popular, huh," Spencer says, lining up his shot. They'd all flipped coins to determine the putting order, winner versus loser until someone came out on top.

"Not really," Pete says, twirling his club absentmindedly. He's dangerously close to a fake palm tree. "I just liked playing soccer."

"Soccer isn't my favorite," Spencer says. "But it's pretty fun."

"Ryan's good at basketball," Brendon says. He's seen Ryan play and it's a little bizarre how good he is, for someone with absolutely no coordination.

"Brendon kicks ass at skateboarding," Ryan says, not looking up from his phone. "Are we playing that game where we all compliment each other?"

"Patrick's handsome," Pete says. Spencer elbows him out of the way, tapping his club against the low brick wall on the side of the hole. The ball slides down the hill and hits Spencer's club, rolling into the hole with a clunk. Spencer does a victory shuffle.

"Pete's annoying," Patrick says. "But he's good at soccer."

"I love you too," Pete says. "Now putt your ball so I can get it in the hole for you."

"Hey, you said no teams," Brendon says.

"Patrick and I are married on the astral plane," Pete says. "We're one person. It's not cheating."

"That is totally cheating."

"Pete, I swear to god, if you try to 'help' my ball--"

"Married," Pete says. "Astral plane. Soulmates. Also it's fun to watch you get all worked up."

"You are the most frustrating person I've ever met," Patrick says. He lines up his shot and swings, and his ball rolls down the fake grass, perfectly aligned. They all watch in silence as his ball rolls neatly into the hole.

"Par," Patrick says, throwing his club over his shoulder and kicking his hip out. At the end of the green, Pete looks like he's about to bust out laughing. "Who's next?"

\--

It turns out that they're not the only people manning the Clandestine booth that night, for when Brendon is eternally grateful. He'd been pretty confident that they could handle this on their own right up until they walked inside the building.

"It's a converted airplane hanger," Pete says. "Top levels are all offices and things. The whole thing is soundproofed."

"Whoa," Brendon says, looking around and trying to adjust his eyes to the height of the room. It's just _big_ , Vegas-Strip big, and when Pete leads them to their booth Brendon can tell he wasn't kidding about the set-up. Every company has their own little area, marked off by rows of tape like a trade show or something. It _is_ a trade show, Brendon realizes, as he looks around. It's just that it's marketed to teenagers, not to business people. He's here selling a look, an image. He's selling a lifestyle.

"This is crazy," Ryan whispers to him, when Pete is otherwise occupied. He too looks slightly overwhelmed.

"Just lie back and think about the album," Spencer whispers, and Brendon nods. He's fine with this, as long as they get their album made. Whatever. He'll get up there half-naked and model t-shirts if that's what Pete wants.

The FBR/Clandestine booth is halfway set up, a large black monstrosity with artfully placed neon type running around the outer walls. There are a few people in back working on screwing everything into place, and Pete brings them over to introduce them.

"Guys, this is Doug," Pete says, gesturing to a bearded guy on a ladder. "He's one of our main marketing guys. He's the one who came up with the idea of a dual showcase, and who reworked one of the booth designs so it looks like this." Doug nods at them, giving them a grin and a wink before going back to nailing whatever he's nailing up there. They also get introduced to Joan (PR), Melissa (Branding and Sales), and Tom, who works logistics and tech. Brendon's starting to think that he needs to run out and get six tattoos tomorrow if he wants to blend in around here.

"Essentially, you're going to be working the crowd with Melissa and Jo," Pete says, handing each of them a black Clandestine shirt to put on instead of their sweaty T-shirts. "They're going to be talking up your new album, and letting people know that if they want to meet one of the bands on the label, it's you guys. Your job is basically to stand here and talk to people and hype up the album. There's tons of handouts in the boxes under the table--10% off coupons, stickers, post-it notes, bartskull ornaments, all that jazz. Give out whatever you like, but don't give too many to any one person."

"Okay," Ryan says, nodding like he's already calculating the situation, trying to decide if Pete is helping them or whoring them out. Brendon's already come down firmly on the side of helping. There's nothing bad about hanging out in a booth and giving free shit to people and talking about music, as long as it happens in air conditioning.

"You good?" Pete says, and waits for them all to nod. "Okay. Then I need to run, I have a working dinner meeting tonight with some of the guys from FBR and the label's accountants. I think we'll be able to squeeze you in for a full month in the studio. That good?"

"Uh, yeah," Spencer says, momentarily stunned.

"Maybe three weeks, don't get excited," Pete says. "But I'm working on it. You and a couple other guys are on the table tonight, I'll see what I can do. Okay, call me if you die, Melissa and Jo will drop you off when it's over."

"Thanks," Brendon says, reaching out to give Pete a hug. He's feeling an intense need to hug Pete right now. It's weird to get to see the back side of making an album, to see all the ways Pete is fighting for them and working and organizing on their behalf. It makes Brendon's chest feel warm and tight.

Pete hugs him back, warm and solid. It's a comforting hug. Brendon tells himself that it doesn't matter what Pete knows, what he thinks. If he's still hugging Brendon like this then it's probably going to be okay.

\--

"That was awesome," Ryan says quietly, as they step out of the car and wave goodbye to Melissa and Jo. They're standing at the bottom of Pete's driveway and the night still seems slightly luminescent, still full of light and sound and music. It's that hush after a concert high that Brendon knows so well, only this time they're in on the joke. Brendon's all-access pass is still tucked inside his wallet for safekeeping.

"Hell yeah," Brendon says, shoving his hands in his pockets as they slowly walk up the drive. His shirt is cooling against his skin, his sweat chilled by the blast of air conditioner in Melissa's car. He's been to a lot of shows but Brendon doesn't think he's ever seen so many teenagers in one place, one _building_ as he did tonight. "Battle of the Bands" had prepared him for a few sets by shitty bands, not the all-star face off they'd witnessed, complete with professional lighting and stage sets. The winning band had gone home tonight with an invitation to pitch to three major indie labels, all of whom were potentially interested. All of the bands were definitely better live than Panic! at the Disco. They need to catch up, and soon.

"I can't even really make words," Spencer says. "I'm still mostly back there. It hasn't worn off yet." Brendon knocks their shoulders together, grinning. Spencer returns it, slipping his hand into Ryan's back pocket as they saunter up the drive.

"I thought Pete was coming back here," Ryan says, frowning up at the dark windows of the house. Brendon hops up and down, waving his arms until Pete's garden lights come on, and then he fumbles around until he finds the dog poop key cover.

"He probably had stuff to do," Brendon says, turning the locks with a click and then stepping inside to punch in the alarm code to Pete's security system. Hemmy gives a low, inquisitive growl from his dog bed near the door, and then a couple of friendly barks when he recognizes their scent.

"Hey boy, hey, good boy," Brendon says, scratching him behind the ears as they step inside and turn on the lights. Now that he's in Pete's kitchen, he's _starving_. Pete has to have something quick and easy in his freezer.

"Food," Ryan says, walking over to Pete's fridge and throwing both doors open. He tosses a package of frozen French fries on the countertop, along with mozzerella sticks, pepperoni, salsa, and three Red Bulls.

"Get the Doritos," Brendon says to Spencer, who's heading into Pete's pantry. Brendon takes a seat at Pete's kitchen island, opening the salsa to sniff it. It looks okay. It's probably fine.

"I don't even know what time it is," Spencer says, coming back with a bag of Doritos and another bag of cheese puffs. "It feels like it's like 4 in the morning."

"It's only 1 a.m.," Brendon says, grabbing a handful of chips. Ryan is currently occupied with dumping the fries onto a cookie sheet and eating the cold pepperoni straight out of the package.

"Plenty of time for an orgy," Spencer says. Brendon tries to smile. Spencer's kidding, except for how he really isn't. Brendon's stomach kind of hurts.

"Do you think Pete has condoms?" Ryan says. "Like, I don't want to go looking through his shit. But maybe he has some in the bathroom or something. Like, for guests."

"Why would we need condoms?" Brendon asks.

"I don't know, why do people normally use condoms," Ryan says, rolling his eyes in Brendon's direction.

"What, you want to start using them now?"

"Not for blowjobs," Ryan says. "You know. For other stuff."

"Oh," Brendon says. He puts his handful of chips back down. His stomach hurts. Maybe he's just thirsty.

"I feel like I saw some in the van," Spencer says. "Maybe they're Brent's or something. I mean, Brendon. you said you never--"

"Yeah," Brendon says. He downs half of his Red Bull in one gulp, and then wipes his mouth before answering. "But maybe Brent left some in there, I dunno."

"We should go check," Spencer says. "Did you set the timer on the oven?"

"Yeah, duh," Ryan says. Spencer still gets up and checks it, which is probably smart.

"B, can we have the keys?" Spencer says. "We'll go look. It won't take too long."

"Uh, yeah." Brendon pulls his keys off the carabiner, hands them to Spencer. He thinks his hands might be shaking. Weird.

He hears the click of the front door closing after them, and then it's entirely silent. Brendon closes his eyes and presses the palms of his hands into his eye sockets, pushing until he hits the edge of pain. He needs to get a fucking grip. He shouldn't be freaking out about this. These are his best friends.

Hemmy plods into the room and leans up against Brendon's leg, whining anxiously until Brendon reaches down to pet him. Usually touching animals grounds him, calms him down, but right now it's not working. He still feels sharp and a little sick, like his bones aren't in the right places anymore.

"Yo, we found some!" Spencer crows, shaking the box in victory as he walks back into the kitchen. Ryan immediately crosses the room to the oven, pulling the door open and poking at the fries even though they're obviously not done yet.

"Ow."

"Maybe you should stop touching things that are on fire," Spencer says. "Anyway, B, check it out. We found these under the back seat." He slides a small package of condoms towards Brendon on the countertop. Brendon picks it up and peers inside to see two unused condoms.

"Awesome, right?" Spencer says. He's genuinely pleased, like he can't wait for whatever they're about to get up too.

"Yeah," Brendon says.

"I bet there's lube upstairs," Ryan says. "Or--we could find something." He looks around the kitchen, squinting in thought.

"Not cooking oil," Spencer says.

"It could work."

"I'm not losing my virginity covered in Crisco."

"Uh, I'm not covering my _dick_ in Crisco either."

"Then what were you--"

"Olive oil. Didn't the Romans do that? They totally did that."

"I'll--go look upstairs," Brendon interrupts, standing up and tucking his keys into his back pocket. His heart is pounding. All he can think about is getting _away_ , getting _out of here_.

Never let them see you break. If he can't do this, he has to get out of here.

"Check in the bathroom," Ryan says, nodding at Brendon before resuming his argument with Spencer about what the Romans used for ancient lube.

Brendon leaves the kitchen and then ignores the stairs entirely, winding a path through the living room and the dining room and the rest of the house until he's standing at the sliding doors to the pool. He holds his breath and carefully shifts the door open, slipping outside as quietly as he can.

Then he takes off at a dead run, down the slope of the garden, past the lights, into the driveway. He yanks the van's door open and slides into the driver's seat with shaking fingers. He sees Spencer's head turn towards the window as he's backing out, and then he hits the gas and he's away, fuck, as away as he can be, as far as he can, until the morning comes.

\--

Brendon drives until he realizes he's entirely lost, and then he keeps driving. Part of him wants to just say fuck and drive all the way back to Vegas, but he knows that's a dumb idea. He's in this for more than just Ryan and Spencer. He just needs some time off, that's all. He needs some time to freak out in private. He's going to find a way out of this. There's obviously something wrong with him, and he just needs to figure out how to fix it.

His phone is silent on the front seat, glinting in the glow of streetlights as he drives. It's 2:45 in the morning. Ryan and Spencer have let three texts and four messages in the last half-hour, and he hasn't looked at or listened to any of them. He doesn't want to deal with them making fun of him for freaking out.

Brendon drives aimlessly until he passes his third all-night diner and realizes he's still hungry. He pulls in and parks, feeling grateful that he at least remembered to bring his wallet. He leaves his phone in the car.

The diner is relatively crowded for 3am, but there are still lots of empty tables. Brendon takes a seat at the counter and then checks his wallet; $15.83 in cash, All-Access pass, his bank cards, his single credit card that he only uses for band expenses, random business cards, one of Ryan's guitar picks. Brendon pulls out the guitar pick and stares at it for a moment, holding it up so he can see it better. It's nothing special, but it's definitely Ryan's--Brendon never buys this brand. He has no idea why he even has it.

He shoves everything back in his wallet and then looks up to see his waiter standing patiently before him.

"Giving up on the LA dream so soon?" the guy says, raising an eyebrow at Brendon and smiling. He's tall and heavy-set, snake-bite piercings and arms covered in tattoos. He looks like an ex-con. He could probably kill Brendon with one hand.

"Uh," Brendon says. "Yeah, something like that." He smiles nervously. The guy seems nice enough, but he's suddenly realized he's all alone and completely lost in the middle of a city where he only knows six people. He's not _scared_ , exactly--he could always suck it up and call Pete or Patrick, or even Andy or Joe. It's just a little disconcerting, to know that if something happened and he disappeared tonight all they'd find would be his phone and his van.

"Pancakes," the guy says, sliding a menu in front of him. "I recommend the pancakes. They're good for shitty days."

"Yeah, well," Brendon says ruefully. "It wasn't that shitty until an hour ago."

"Lost love, I get it," the guy says, nodding. "Coffee?"

"Yeah."

"Be right back."

Brendon skims through the menu, trying to decide between breakfast, dinner, or some combination of the two. Pancakes sound pretty good, but so do the mozzarella sticks. And fuck it, he wants bacon. He'll go back to being a vegetarian tomorrow.

"You take it black?" the guy says, pulling a mug up from under the counter and placing it front of Brendon. He's holding a fresh pot of coffee in one hand, while the decaf pot burbbles  
on the coffee maker.

"Uh, milk and sugar if you have it," Brendon says. He wishes he was cool enough to drink it black, but it always tastes like motor oil to him if he doesn't dump three packets of sugar in.

"No problem," the guy says, reaching under the counter for a sugar dispenser and a small metal milk pot. Brendon watches him work, and as the guy slides the milk pot around so that the handle is facing Brendon, Brendon notices the tattoo of two interlocked male symbols on the inside of the guy's wrist and feels a little less afraid.

"You know what you want?"

"Blueberry pancakes, bacon on the side, and one order of mozzarella sticks."

"Good choice."

"Yeah."

Brendon's server puts his order in to the kitchen, and then walks off to go take care of some of the other customers. There are a few tables of violently drunk teenagers and twenty-somethings, as well as some tourists, a construction worker, and a guy who looks like a security officer. There's a homeless woman in the back, sitting at a booth and staring out the window, sipping her cup of coffee very slowly. Her face is deeply lined. Her cart is pulled up next to her, a stained sleeping bag and pallet visible on top.

Brendon turns back towards the front of the diner. His server is wiping the counter down near the cash register, looking bored.

"You want to talk, or you want to be left alone?" the guy says, finishing up and flipping his cleaning rag over his shoulder. "Because I don't know about you, but I'm pretty fucking bored."

Brendon snorts, and takes a sip of his coffee. His stomach is slowly starting to settle down.

"I'm going to interpret that as, you want to talk," the guy says, leaning on the counter. Brendon starts to instinctively pull away, because whoa, the guy is really close.

"Maybe later," Brendon says, an alarm bell ringing somewhere in his head.

"Whoa, my bad," the guy says, taking one look at Brendon's face and backing away, holding up his hands. "Didn't mean to freak you out, kid. I'm not trying to pick you up or anything, seriously. I'm just bored and everyone else in here is drunk."

Brendon blinks at him. "I'm not a hooker."

"I know you're not."

"Okay," Brendon says. "Right."

"If you were a hooker you would have leaned right in just then," the guys says.

"Do you...know a lot of male hookers?" Brendon says, trying to just roll with the absurdity of this conversation.

"I think they prefer to be called sex workers," the guy says. "But yeah, sometimes they come in here. Unfortunately for them, I'm not really interested in buying. Got my man and two kids at home. I'm Roger, by the way," he says, holding out his hand for Brendon to shake.

"Brendon," Brendon says, automatically reaching to shake back. The guy could be lying just to lure Brendon into a false sense of security, but Brendon doesn't think he is. Brendon generally has good instincts when it comes to trusting people.

"Nice to meet you," Roger says. "So, Brendon. Why was tonight so shitty?"

"Just...band stuff," Brendon says, looking away. He takes another sip of his coffee.

"Band break up?"

"Nah," Brendon says. "They just--I think we have different ideas about where we want to take our sound." _And our sex life_ , he thinks to himself.

"You try talking to them about it?"

"No," Brendon says. He pulls the tines of his fork against the edge of his napkin, shredding the paper into thin, messy slices.

"Maybe you should start there."

"Do you get off on giving random advice to people in the middle of the night, or something?" Brendon snaps.

"I spent ten years drinking, and ten years in AA. Giving random advice to people who don't give a fuck is kind of my specialty." Roger grins.

Brendon lifts his hand up, letting it fall back down to the countertop with a thud. He shakes his head. He doesn't even know what he wants to say. Roger seems nice enough, and like he's trying to help. Brendon just doesn't know what the fuck he wants. Maybe he should just tell Roger everything. Maybe he'll have some ideas.

"I don't know what the fuck I want," Brendon says. "They want to have sex and I freaked out. I'm fucking 19," Brendon says, intentionally upping his age. Roger doesn't need to know he's talking to a minor. "Everyone my age wants to have sex, Jesus. I want to have sex. Just not, like. Tomorrow."

"Band was a euphemism, huh," Roger says, nodding sagely.

"No, it's--we're actually in a band," Brendon says, giving up and just resting his head on the countertop for a moment. How is this his _life_.

"You and the other guy?"

"I...yeeeeeah," Brendon says. "Me and the--other guy."

"You said 'they' before," Roger says mildly.

"It's complicated."

"This is LA. Wouldn't be the first time," Roger shrugs. He turns and pulls Brendon's food out of the serving slot leading to the kitchen, grabbing a bottle of syrup on his way. "You want more coffee?"

"Yeah," Brendon says weakly. He concentrates on smothering his pancakes in syrup.

Roger refills his cup, and then pours one for himself. He leans back against the refrigerated cabinet holding the pies and crosses his arms, looking thoughtful.

"When did you figure out you were into guys?" Roger says. "If you don't mind me asking."

"Grew up Mormon," Brendon says. "I always knew, I just--didn't want to think about it."

"Same," Roger says nodding. "Well, the not wanting to think about it part, not the Mormon part. You come out to your folks?"

"No fucking way," Brendon says. "I just came out these guys like, a week ago."

"That's brave."

"I saw them fucking," Brendon says. "I figured they wouldn't burn me at the stake."

"Right."

"And it's just fucking complicated right now," Brendon says. "Between all of us. And like, we're all fucking, or something, we've _been_ fucking, but they want to actually, like--" Brendon pauses, remember his surroundings and lowering his voice. "You know," Brendon says, giving Roger an emphatic look.

"I see."

"Yeah."

"And you don't want to?" Roger asks. He takes a long sip of his coffee. "It doesn't make you weak, you know. Being on the bottom."

"I know," Brendon says, his face flaming. He can't believe he's having his conversation in public, with a stranger, but Roger gives off this weird 'gay fairy godmother' vibe. If fairy godmothers were 300 pounds and had beards.

"So you just don't want to?"

"I'm not ready for that," Brendon says. "There's something wrong with my brain, I just keep freaking out when I think about it. " Shame burns low in his stomach.

"There's nothing _wrong_ with you," Roger scoffs, shaking his head. "Who told you that?"

"What?"

"There's nothing wrong with you," Roger says again. "Plenty of people don't do that. And what, you figured it out like a week ago? Chill the fuck out, kid. You got lots of time."

"What?" Brendon says again. Roger's words feel like a splash of cold water to his face, but not in a bad way.

"Chill out and eat your pancakes," Roger says. "And if they're getting on your case about it, tell them to go fuck themselves. That's my advice."

"Uh," Brendon says. He takes another bite of his pancakes. "Okay."

"Life's too short to worry about that bullshit," Roger says. He sets his coffee cup down, pulling his wallet out of his back pocket. There's a picture inside of another big tattooed guy holding two young kids, one in each arm. "You know what's important to me? My kids. My man. Everything else is just background noise."

"Right."

"Figure out what's important to you, and then do it," Roger says putting his wallet away. "And that's enough self-help bullshit for tonight, Jesus. I'm going to go take care of the customers and then we can talk about your band. I like listening to people talk about their bands, even if they suck."

"We don't suck," Brendon says automatically. "We're fucking awesome. We're going to be huge."

"Good!" Roger says, slapping the table and then pointing at Brendon. "That's the first step, you gotta be arrogant as fuck if you're going to make it. Never sell yourself short."

 _We won't_ , Brendon thinks, as he watches Roger amble down towards a drunk couple at the end of the bar. _I won't. Not about them. Never_.

\--

Brendon's phone rings as he's pulling out of the parking lot of the diner. He stares at it for a moment and then he picks it, flipping open his phone. It's Spencer.

"Hey," Brendon says, flicking on his blinker to make a right turn. He mostly drove west to get here, so he figures he'll drive east until everything looks familiar again. It's almost dawn.

"Where'd you go?" Spencer says softly. His voice is tight, like he's upset and trying not to show it.

"Needed some space," Brendon says. He's not trying to be a dick, but the words come out sharp.

"You scared the fuck out of Ryan," Spencer says. "He thought you left for good."

"I wouldn't do that," Brendon says. "You know that."

"Yeah."

"Why'd you run away?"

"Freaked out," Brendon says. "Anyway, I'm coming home now. I think. If I can figure out where the hell I am."

"You're lost?"

"Kinda," Brendon says, trying to scan street signs and drive and talk to Spencer all at the same time.

"Just find somewhere to pull over and we'll meet you," Spencer says. "Pete said we can borrow his car. It's got GPS."

"I think I'm--oh, I'm at the Santa Monica pier," Brendon says, suddenly recognizing his surroundings. The air over the sea is thin and filmy, with a dissipated light breaking through the clouds. The sun is about to rise.

"We'll meet you there," Spencer says. "Don't go anywhere. We'll be right there."

"I could probably find my way back."

"Just let us come get you," Spencer pleads, and Brendon can hear everything that Spencer's not saying.

"Okay," Brendon says. He hangs up and then he pulls into a parking lot that faces out onto the ocean. He cuts the engine and then he pushes his seat back, kicking his legs up on the dashboard. His head feels tired and empty, stuffed with cotton and devoid of any real thoughts. He doesn't know what he's going to say to Ryan and Spencer. He doesn't know if they're all even fighting anymore, or if they were fighting in the first place.

He looks out towards the bay, and waits for the sun to rise.

\--

Spencer's hug is strong and fierce, like he wants to make sure that Brendon knows he's there. Ryan doesn't look at Brendon but he clings tightly, holding on far longer than Brendon expects. Brendon rubs Ryan's back and presses his face into Ryan's thin shoulder.

"Are you okay?" Ryan says, after he's pulled back. He gives Brendon a confused, searching look, like he's trying to figure out what went wrong. 

"Yeah, I'm fine," Brendon says. He looks down at his toes. "Can we go sit on the beach?"

"Yeah," Ryan and Spencer say, in unison. They're almost entirely alone on the pier. Brendon can see a few dog-walkers in the distance, but that's it.

Once they're all settled, socks balled up and shoes kicked away, Brendon opens his mouth.

"I don't know if I can do this," Brendon says, and it _hurts_ , even just speaking the words hurts all the way down in his bones. He wants to cry. He won't, but he wants to.

"What?" Spencer says. "You--what? Brendon--no, come on, please--"

"I can't," Brendon says. Ryan slips his fingers into Brendon's, holding on tightly. He's staring out into the waves and not looking at either of them. 

"Why not," Spencer says, and if his voice cracks slightly at the edges, no one mentions it. "You can't. You're not allowed to leave the band because of this, whatever it was, I swear. We'll do whatever you want. You can't _leave_." He stands up, starting to pace. 

Brendon smiles humorlessly. "I'm not leaving the band," Brendon says, because in the time since he spoke to Roger he's been thinking about what he said, turning it over and over. Roger had told him to figure out what matters. Brendon knows deep down inside that it's music, it's always been music. He's not leaving this band, even if it's going to hurt to stay. He's not leaving _his_ band.

"Then what are you--"

"He's leaving _us_ ," Ryan says dully. "Get with the program, Spencer." 

"What the fuck? _No_ ," Spencer says, and he looks angry, like he's spoiling for a fight. Brendon's too tired for this. He can hear the echo of old pains in Ryan's voice, and he doesn't like it. 

"It's not--" Brendon bites his lip, trying to figure out what he wants to say. "I can't do this, okay? I can't--just fuck around with you guys. You're so serious about each other and I'm just the third wheel, like you wanted a new plaything or something.

“I'm happy for you guys, and like, thank you and shit, you know, for letting me in. I get what you were trying to do. But I can't do that if I'm just something you're going to throw away."

"Brendon," Spencer snaps, and Brendon winces even more, because that is Spencer's _I'm not fucking around_ voice.

"Look at me," Spencer says, and Brendon raises his eyes so he can see Spencer's face. Spencer looks drawn and determined, like he's fighting a war with no hope of victory.

Brendon looks away, trying to hide, and Spencer reaches his arms out and pulls Brendon up from the sand. For a second he thinks Spencer's going to hit him, but instead he grabs Brendon's hips and pulls him in for a hard, bruising kiss. Their mouths slide together and all Brendon can think is _fuck, we're in public, we're in **public**_ , but there's no one around and he suspects Spencer is making a statement.

"You are not a third wheel," Spencer says, when he pulls away. He's breathing hard, from the kiss or the adrenaline, Brendon can't tell. "You are the dude I couldn't approach for years because you were Mormon and straight. You were the guy I was _never going to have_ , Brendon. "

"What?" Brendon says, squinting at Spencer in the morning light. "I thought—isn't that _Ryan_?"

"Ryan felt the same way," Spencer says. "How the hell did you think we first figured it out? You came to band practice and Ryan was all freaked out and pissed off until I finally made him admit that he thought you were hot."

"That's—" Brendon searches for words. "Unbelievable." 

"It's what happened," Ryan says, shrugging and standing up to join them. He looks at Brendon for a long time. The wind is pushing his dirty hair off his forehead, and there's a scab over his right cheekbone. Brendon can't remember where it came from. 

"I like you," Ryan finally says. "Don't leave. I want to keep doing this." 

"It's not going to last," Brendon says. 

"So what?" Spencer says. "Nothing lasts forever anyway." 

"Yeah," Brendon says. He turns and looks out at the waves. "I need a little bit more than that, though. I guess I'm not cut out for fucking around with people. Or I'm not cut out for fucking around with people and then still being friends with them." 

"Neither am I," Ryan says, smiling ruefully. "But we've been doing this for a week and I haven't fucked it up yet, so I've already beaten my last track record." 

"Well, I'm just a sorry douchebag who hasn't dated anyone," Spencer says. "Does that count?"

"Shut up," Brendon says, knocking his shoulder into Spencer's. "You're awesome. You'd make an awesome boyfriend."

"So _be_ my awesome boyfriend," Spencer says. "Both of you. I'm serious." 

"I don't even get how this is going to work," Brendon says. "What, do we take turns dating each other or something?"

"No, we keep doing what we've been doing," Ryan says. "And maybe sometimes there's other people, who knows. I don't want to stop sleeping with girls, like, forever." 

"We'll work it out," Spencer says, shrugging. "But Brendon, we're not going to abandon you. I promise. We did actually think about this before we seduced you."

"Which we were awesome at, by the way," Ryan says. "No one ever did compliment me on my seduction skills."

"It's not seduction if I'm dying for it," Brendon says, cracking a smile. Ryan is such a douche. "And I was totally dying for it, let's be real." 

"Whatever, so were we," Ryan says dismissively. "Which is why we're not breaking up with each other."

"I thought you just wanted me around because suddenly I liked dick and you thought I was hot," Brendon says.

"We're in L.A.," Ryan says dryly. "There's not exactly a shortage of that around here." 

"Point," Brendon concedes. He shoves his hands in his pockets. His stomach flutters, and he can't tell if it's excitement or fear. 

"Can I be serious for a second, though?" Brendon says. Spencer nods, crossing his arms and tilting his head to one side to listen. "I really don't want to get fucked," Brendon says, and it hurts to get the words out, but he knows there's no other way. "Maybe some other time. But not right now. And I can't, like—I don't want people to know I'm gay? Or that we're dating. I want some people to know, but not everyone right away."

"We were huge dicks about the fucking thing," Spencer says, looking down at the sand. "I'm sorry, B. We should have like, stopped and realized you were freaking out." 

"You don't have to do that," Ryan says. "I mean, I kind of want to try it? But I won't if it freaks you out." 

"I don't care if _you_ guys fuck," Brendon says. "As long as you're not expecting me to join in, that sounds pretty sweet." 

"Just tell us what you want," Spencer says. "If you're freaking out, just say something. I'm not going to laugh."

"Me either," Ryan says. "I've watched clown porn before. I have no room to judge." 

"You—wait, seriously...?"

"Gotta try everything once," Ryan says giving Spencer and Brendon a _duh, obviously_ sort of look. "Anyway. I'm just saying, whatever you want is cool. Or whatever you don't want. And I don't want to come out either. Who I'm sleeping with is nobody's business." 

"Yeah," Spencer says. "Not right now. We have enough shit to take care of, you know? I can't even think about dealing with that." 

"Okay," Brendon says. He takes a deep breath, tensing up, filling his lungs with air and letting his stomach hollow out. Then he releases the breath, releases _everything_ , trying to pour his uncertainty and his fear into the crashing waves. 

"We want you here," Spencer says. "So, are you in? Please say you're in." The wind is picking up, blowing through Spencer's hair and forcing him to tuck it behind his ears.

"Yeah," Brendon says. His chest is starting to feel light again, even with everything that's pressing down on them--Pete's set tonight, the album, saving up enough money to get to Maryland, coming up with another ten songs in the next three months.

"Awesome," Ryan says. He hugs Brendon from behind, shoving his nose behind Brendon's left ear. "Can we go home now and have this conversation in bed? I'm so fucking tired."

"You are such a douchebag," Brendon says.

"Yes," Ryan says patiently. He presses a kiss to Brendon's neck. "I know. Seriously, though. Bed. I'm going to hang a big sign on the door that says SLEEPING, FUCK OFF so Pete doesn't walk in with another one of his crazy-ass morning ideas. "

"Does Pete even know that you took his car?" Brendon yawns, long and loud.

"We left a note," Spencer says, shrugging. "I'm sure it's fine." Brendon can feel a warm glow starting somewhere deep down in his chest. He doesn't know where he's going, or what they're all doing, which he's starting to realize is probably the best place for him to be.

Fuck it, they're going to conquer the world. Who cares if their relationship is slightly unconventional. Brendon can figure out all of this shit on the road, when he's moving. He thinks best that way anyway. He's got this shit on lockdown.

"We're going to conquer the fucking world," Brendon says, as they're walking back to the car.

"Yeah," Ryan says, holding Brendon's door open for him like a thin and unwashed Vanna White. Spencer squeezes Brendon's hand once, and then lets go as Brendon sits down in the driver's seat. They're clustered near Brendon's window, like they're afraid to let him out of their sight again. It's a sweet sort of obsession. Brendon will take it. 

"You guys can get in the car now," Brendon says, after they've all just stood there for a few seconds. "I'm not going to run away. I'm going to tail you the whole way home, I promise."

"You better," Ryan threatens. 

"I will," Brendon says. "Cross my heart and hope to die. Or something." 

"Seal it with a kiss," Spencer says, and leans through Brendon's open window to kiss him again. Spencer's mouth is warm and searching, and Brendon feels a soft ache open up somewhere inside. Kissing Spencer just makes him think about sex, but as much as he wants to go home and roll around with both of them for hours, sleeping is the smarter option. 

"Promise," Brendon whispers, and Spencer nods against his mouth. Brendon pulls back and then leans in to kiss Ryan, because it's not fair if he doesn't promise it to Ryan, too. 

Ryan's kiss is fast and hard, like he wants to stake his claim. It's fucking hot, and Brendon has to pull away after a few seconds, breathing hard.

"Okay," Brendon says. "Promise. And no more of that or I'm going to get lost because I'm distracted by my boner." 

"Good," Ryan says, looking wicked. "Now let's go home."

"So someone can blow you before you fall asleep?"

"I'm not _that_ transparent." 

"Yes you are," Spencer says, flicking Ryan in the temple. "Come on, let's go before Brendon ruins the upholstery."

"Shut up, I have stamina," Brendon says, starting his engine. He watches as Ryan and Spencer hop into Pete's car, his crazy black SUV with all the gadgets and dials and shit. He hopes like hell that Spencer doesn't crash it on the way back. Spencer's a good driver, but still.

The SUV pulls up to the exit from the parking lot, waiting for a single car to go by. Then Ryan leans his whole upper body out the passenger-side window, waving to get Brendon's attention.

"The whole fucking world!!" Ryan yells, as much to the sand and sky as to Brendon. Brendon laughs and gives Ryan the devil horns sign through his windshield. 

"Lead on, motherfuckers!" Brendon yells back, and follows Spencer out into the road.


End file.
